The Devil's Table
by Stealth Dragon
Summary: Arthur and Gwaine rescue Merlin from the clutches of slave traders only to find themselves trapped in a strange castle whose residents have up and vanished. There's something in the castle that's after them, and to make matters worse, Merlin is already injured and can't use his magic. Gen. Friendship.
1. Chapter 1

Rating: T

Characters: Merlin, Arthur, Gwaine

Warnings: Violence, non-explicit depictions of gore, mentions of torture

Summary: Arthur and Gwaine rescue Merlin from the clutches of slave traders only to find themselves trapped in a strange castle whose residents have up and vanished. There's something in the castle that's after them, and to make matters worse, Merlin is already injured and can't use his magic.

A/N: Written for the 2012 Bromance Big Bang. This story is complete, edited, ready to go and will be updated daily (except Sunday)

~oOo~

The Devil's Table

by

Stealth Dragon

Back when the dragon had still been a prisoner beneath Camelot, he and Merlin would often have long chats over all things of a magical nature. It had begun after the dragon had created the sword and made Merlin swear that only Arthur would use it. Merlin had felt bad that he hadn't been able to keep his promise, but not knowing how to make it up to the dragon, he had attempted to keep him company when he could, instead.

Merlin was quite sure it had been more beneficial for him than the dragon. He had learned much, adding to the knowledge already gained through his magic book – like why invisibility and shape-changing spells were so dangerous, which magical creatures truly existed and which were merely myth, and special manacles that could bind a sorcerer's power.

Magic can never truly be stopped when it is a part of you, Kilgarrah had said. A sorcerer controlled magic outside the body, the magic inherit in the very world. When bound by magical chains they were cut off from the source of their power and so left vulnerable. A Warlock called upon the magic from within himself, a magic he could not be cut off from, a magic that was part of his very being as much as his heart and soul. Enchanted chains could only dampen their abilities, not stop them. One would need something far more special and complicated to render a warlock completely helpless.

What he had failed to mention was that even simple enchanted chains still did just fine in turning a warlock helpless. Maybe they didn't stop Merlin's powers completely, but calling the chains a hindrance was a cruel understatement. Merlin could use his magic, but it hurt, and the greater the magic he used the greater the agony.

All Merlin had done was break a bloody lock and explode a few bloody cooking fires, and yet his arms throbbed as though they'd been _broken_. He was drained, and sick, and it was the last blasted thing he needed when he was trying to run for his blasted life.

"This Way! Over here!"

"I see tracks!"

"This way!"

Merlin's heart shot into his throat and stuck there. He scrambled up a slope slick with mud and slush. Slipping was inevitable, landing him hard on his damaged chest. Riding through the pain and remembering how to breathe cost him seconds he didn't have, and his damn wrists kept giving out on him every time he attempted to climb.

But he made it to the top. Now it was only his numb feet he had to deal with. He'd wrapped them in the rags tossed to him in his cage to keep warm but the slush had soaked them to useless. But losing his toes would be a small price to pay if he could _just keep going_, get far, get away and not end up the magical plaything for some fat lord with a grudge against Camelot. Lords, he was never going on a hunt along the borders of the kingdom with Arthur ever again; bloody slavers and their bloody inability to lay low during one of the harshest winters in the realm.

Speaking of which, snow began to fall, again – huge, fat flanks heralding a land that would soon be buried under arctic white. It landed on Merlin's ragged shirt, soaking through the thread-bare material and giving him another reason to shiver. He stumbled over logs and clung to trees, losing more seconds trying to catch his breath.

As if being taken by slavers hadn't been bad enough, the real irony was that they had seen him use magic to protect Arthur. All the years of flinging spells about and it was a bunch of slavers who witnessed it. He supposed he should be grateful; the leader of the group – who hadn't been as inclined as his men to go on a raid – had wanted to kill Merlin on the spot for being too scrawny. That Merlin had magic saved him. Caged sorcerers fetched a fine price, and they had just the manacles to control him.

The chains of those manacles clinked like a crack through the winter-shrouded woodland. The shouting voices of Merlin's hunters were closer, surrounding him. Merlin coughed a panicked sob from his burning lungs.

If they caught him, he wouldn't be able to use his magic. Each spell he cast required time to let his body overcome the pain and regain its strength, time he didn't have, his strength waning the more he ran.

He just needed to keep going, get over the border to the main road where there was bound to be a patrol. He had to be close, now - he'd been running for bloody ever. Merlin pushed from the tree he was currently clinging to and staggered forward.

His foot caught a root and he fell, chest first. He was too slow to bite back the cry of pain that tore from his throat.

"I have to hand it to you, lad. You gave us quite a chase, wisp of a thing that you are."

Merlin whipped his head around.

It was the leader, the man who wouldn't go on raids but who would happily hunt down a skinny, injured boy like he was a wild boar. He was flanked by two of his men, smiling to show their black, crooked teeth. Pain forgotten, exhaustion forgotten, Merlin scrambled to his feet, grabbing a fallen branch along the way. He stood, swaying on his aching limbs, branch brandished like a sword.

Jimbol, the leader, barked out a belly laugh. "Oh, my boy, you are damn persistent, I'll give you that. I admire it. In fact I admire it so much I'm going to give you a bit of a fighting chance to make things interesting." He pulled the sword from the sheathe of one of his men and tossed it to Merlin. He then pulled his own sword.

"Pick it up, boy," Jimbol said. He took the familiar stance of a man who knew his way around a blade. "You want you're freedom then you're going to need to earn it."

Merlin tossed the branch aside and grabbed the sword. It was stupid, he was painfully aware of it. He was no swordsman, no seasoned warrior, and most of the time counted it luck that he managed to hit anything all when he did use a weapon. But he wasn't completely helpless with a blade. You don't suffer years of being a king's target for sword practice without picking up a few skills. But he was wounded, tired and barely standing upright – everything your opponent needed for an easy victory. But if Merlin had to go down, he could at least go down fighting.

_I'm not the coward you always say I am, Arthur._

"Shall we begin?" Jimbol said. He lifted his sword in salute and surged forward.

_Goodbye, Arthur_. With a cry of defiance, Merlin met Jimbol head on. Metal rang sharp against metal. For a moment, Merlin was riding high on what he was sure was him holding his own. Except Jimbol was smiling and seemed to put no effort into his attacks. He was drawing this out, having his fun. Skill had nothing to do with this on Merlin's part.

Jimbol proved as much when he feinted left and sliced a thin, straight line across the tip of Merlin's breast bone. Merlin stumbled back, ignoring the pain that was one out of too many to count. Jimbol attacked and it was all Merlin could do to keep him at bay. Another line was added to Merlin's body across his ribs. Another feint and Merlin tumbled forward. The hot touch of the blade cut him across the upper back and he arched, screaming. Jimbol and his men laughed.

Merlin fell to his hands and knees, shaking, panting, dripping blood. Jimbol toed him in his wounded flank.

"What do you think, lads? Think he's had enough?" Jimbol chuckled.

There followed an odd whirring sound that, from one breath to the next, Merlin was sure was Jimbol's blade coming down to add another wound to his body.

Then slaver one toppled forward like a tree, a knife embedded in his neck.

"I think he's damn well had enough!" shouted a voice that might as well have been the singing of angels for all its familiarity.

Merlin looked up and gaped. Relief nearly toppled him when Arthur exploded from between the trees, raging like a lion as he met Jimbol head on without mercy, filling the woods with the hammering of metal.

The second slaver pulled his weapon to help his master. A second body blocked him and attacked like a wolf going for the kill.

Gwaine.

It was a brief fight, no longer than five heartbeats, and a slice to the chest brought the slaver down. Gwaine, soaring high on fight, his hair a tangled mop, dropped to one knee beside Merlin and grinned.

"Merlin, my friend, am I right to guess we're a sight for sore eyes?"

"And then some," Merlin said, smiling so big his face ached, his body fit to fly apart he was shaking so much but not from pain or cold. Then a glanced behind him dropped the smile. "Arthur..."

"I think his kingness won't be much longer," Gwaine said as he draped his cloak over Merlin's back.

True to Gwaine's words, Arthur backed Jimbol into a tree and with one vicious swing of his blade, opened Jimbol's throat. Jimbol crumpled to the ground, wide-eyed and choking on his own blood.

Arthur wiped his blade clean on the old gray cloak he was wearing and turned to Merlin and Gwaine. He sheathed his weapon, put his hands on his hips, and glared.

"Of all the days to attempt an escape, you had to pick today," Arthur said.

"Huh?" Merlin said, dazed. He let Gwaine help him to his feet, then hold him steady.

"That was his less than polite way of saying we've come to rescue you," Gwaine said.

"What would have been a nice, _quiet_ rescue," Arthur went on, tossing his hands up.

Gwaine grinned. "I got to play a lord. Arthur was my servant."

Which would explain why Arthur was looking particularly grubby in peasant clothes and Gwaine a little more – not resplendent, but definitely not grubby.

"We barely make it to the slave auction before the biddings begin and what do we see?" Arthur went on. "Your dark, idiot head making for the woods and a dozen men giving chase. You led us through half the blasted forest trying to get to you."

"Speaking of a dozen men," Gwaine cut in, "Might I suggest we make ourselves scarce? Much as I love a good fight I don't think poor Merlin here is going to stay on his own two feet for much longer..."

But Arthur ignored him, caught up in his need to chastise his manservant as though he had been denied the privilege for too long and couldn't wait anymore.

Which, at any other time, Merlin would have recognized Arthur's rather weak fury for what it was – him hiding concern behind prattishness. But Merlin was so damn tired, and hurting, and hungry and... Lords, he couldn't stop shaking... and the need to get away still raged within his rapidly beating heart.

"I don't care," Merlin spat, seething. "I'm sorry but I don't. I couldn't... couldn't take it, all right? I tried waiting for you but... three weeks, Arthur. I was with them for three weeks. I couldn't take it anymore."

And if Arthur thought him a coward for it, then so be it. Slavers were not kind. Jimbol's group liked to charge extra for having broken their merchandise before sales, and a broken warlock was twice as sought after as a whole one.

Merlin had just wanted the pain to stop.

Gwaine's arm tightened around his shoulders. "It's all right, Merlin. All that really matters is that we found you. _Right_, Arthur?"

Merlin glanced at Arthur. His expression, much to Merlin's surprise, had softened considerably. He inclined his head.

"Right. You're right, Gwaine. Merlin, can you walk?"

"Um... I can try."

"To hell with that. Merlin, on my back," Gwaine said, crouching to put said back within easy climbing reach.

Merlin balked. "What? No! What if we're attacked, I'll just be in your way."

"Merlin," Arthur said in that way in which he managed to turn Merlin's name into a multitude of warnings and orders. Merlin huffed, tossing up his hands to make the chains rattle, but did as told. He eased the chains over Gwaine's head and wrapped his arms around his neck. Gwaine lifted him with ease.

"Wait," Arthur said. He went to the bodies of the three slavers and searched them. When he came up empty handed, he cursed. "I want those shackles removed but they don't have the keys."

"Those are kept with the auctioneer," Merlin said.

Gwaine snorted. "Lovely. Back to that cesspit, I take it?"

Arthur, taking the lead as they set off, shook his head. "No. Too risky. The links look small enough to cut through with a sword and we can try to pick the locks of the manacles as soon as we are somewhere safe."

"I can suffer them a little longer if it means getting out of here, believe me," Merlin said, even as his arms throbbed all the way to his spine and his wrists burned. The manacles, though not too tight, had chafed them bloody.

With his feet no longer on the ground and his body numbed by exhaustion for the time being, Merlin was lulled into a detached state by the rhythm of Gwaine's movements. He had no idea which direction they were going nor did he really care. Not until they came to the pathway of trampled grass and mud – a path, Merlin knew, that led straight to the slave market.

Panic squeezed Merlin's chest. "Arthur, what-"

Arthur held up his hand, silencing Merlin. He then whistled three times, the final whistle long and shrill. Moments later there was the sound of hoof beats, and Arthur's and Gwaine's horses – who Merlin would know anywhere, having mucked their stalls and groomed them long enough – came trotting through the mud. Arthur aided Gwaine in getting Merlin onto Gwaine's horse, with Gwaine mounting from behind. Then Arthur was up and they were off, fast as they could go without giving Merlin's body too many reasons to protest.

Fortunately, Merlin was still numb, probably not a good thing in the grand scheme of bodily ills but it was a respite he accepted whole-heartedly. He was found, he was safe, and he was going home. He could worry later. Right now, he gladly let his exhaustion take him.

TBC...


	2. Chapter 2

Ch. 2

Merlin woke up and, by all that was holy, why did he have to wake up at all? The respite, it seemed, was over. His body was tired of being neglected, and it was now letting Merlin know it with a force just bordering on sending him back to that happy oblivion but not letting him. It seemed it didn't matter in whose hands he was in – friend or foe – the torture wasn't going to end.

A hard gust of wind cutting through him like a knife agreed. As much as he didn't want to, Merlin forced his eyes open only to slam them shut against an assault of stinging snow.

"Bloody blizzard!" he heard Gwaine shout above the howling wind. "If I knew a sorcerer was nearby I'd say this wasn't natural."

Merlin stiffened, searching himself and the familiar warmth of his activated magic. Gaius had said he could be a little... "magic" twitchy when ill or bone-deep tired. But he remembered the manacles like ice against his wrists and felt no new pains. This wasn't his doing.

Gwaine's arm tightened around his shoulders, bracing Merlin against his chest. "It's all right, Merlin. We'll find a way through this."

Merlin hunkered down into the cloak that had been cocooned tightly around him, but no amount of huddling would fortify him against this blizzard.

"Arthur, are you near!" he heard Gwaine call. Merlin popped his eyes open wide, searching the near-solid white for the king.

"Here!" he heard Arthur call. Then Merlin saw him, a dark, hazy shape through the snow veering closer toward them. "I see lights ahead! Look!" A dark splotch roughly the shape of an arm pointed. Both Merlin and Gwaine looked ahead. Sure enough, lights flickering like fireflies hovered just ahead of them.

The horses plowed through the rising drifts toward the lights, and Merlin fervently prayed those lights weren't willow-th'-wisps. One of Gaius' many books of mythical creatures had talked of them, of how they resided in the worst places and came at the worst possible times, when travelers were lost, desperate and willing to follow anything.

But the lights grew larger, as well as numerous when the horses skirted around the foot of a hill blocking the worst of the winds. The lights were close, now - so close Merlin was tempted to reach out, touch them and absorb their warmth.

The horse suddenly stopped, snorting in derision and skipping a step back.

"Easy there, my lad," Gwaine said, patting the horse's neck. "Looks like Kessey's found our salvation." Gwaine turned the horse enough to press his hand to a wall, a stone wall, the biting cold of it seeping into Merlin's shoulder.

"Follow the wall. Find an entrance!" Arthur shouted.

Gwaine did so by slapping along the mortared stones until the next slap became a thump.

Gwaine laughed. "Got it! Must be our lucky day. Feels to be open."

"Who the hell leaves their gates open in a blizzard like this!" Arthur griped from behind.

"Why don't we ask them once we get inside," Gwaine said. He chuckled. "If this isn't a trap and they don't kill us on the spot."

Merlin gulped audibly but it was lost to the wind. Gwaine steered his horse through the entrance. It was like crossing a barrier into another world, the wind dying and the snow thinned out to swirling flakes tumbling over the high ramparts. Merlin braced himself for the worst – arrows, swords, men shouting.

The only sound was the wind and the crunch of powdery snow.

"Good news. No one's waiting to kill us," Gwaine said.

Arthur steered his horse up beside them. "I can see that." He squinted up at the walls, then the courtyard itself. It wasn't a large structure, at least compared to Camelot. It was more the size of the ruins of the Isle of the Blessed but far more simple.

"Does something strike you as odd?" Arthur asked, still looking around and still with the terse expression normally seen when he believed the enemy was close at hand.

"You mean other than the door being left open?" Gwaine said. His tone, however, was far from jovial. "I don't know. The lack of any guards on the wall is rather bothersome. I'd say they were in the guard towers except no one's tried to take a shot at us."

"They couldn't see us in the blizzard?" Arthur suggested.

Merlin felt Gwaine shrug. "Towers look in as well as out. They would have seen us by now. And, again. Door. Open. Never mind the guards, I've got enough problems with _that_."

All the same, they urged the horses deeper into the courtyard.

"Hello!" Arthur called. "Is anyone there! We mean you no harm. A snow storm has taken us by surprise and we have a man injured and in need of urgent care. Is it possible to ask for sanctuary?"

Their answer was a gust of wind buffeting against them.

"I'm really not liking this," Gwaine muttered.

"I'm liking it even less. But we can't continue in this storm," Arthur said. He led the way to the nearest door, a large set as big as the gates. Arthur hopped from his horse and tugged at the ornate handle. It moaned open. Arthur stuck his head inside.

"Hello? Anyone?" Even from the outside Merlin could hear the way his voice echoed. Arthur tugged the door wide enough for them plus the horses to get through.

"By the gods, it's beautiful," Gwaine breathed. They had entered a great Cathedral of a chamber with a vaulted roof supported by towering pillars of amber glittering with bits of quartz. There were no chairs, only a wide open marble floor covered in a red and black rug so intricately woven with impossible Celtic knots that Merlin had a hard time believing magic wasn't somehow involved in its creation. At the other end of the chamber was a dais with a plinth, and behind it a great stained-glass window of red, gold, white and black.

Arthur, however, was more interested in the door across from the entrance. It was smaller, but still a struggle for Arthur to open. Gwaine, in the meantime, steered his horse to the plinth and swiped a finger across it.

"Clean." His eyes strayed to the many candles dripping wax all over their sconces. "Very clean. Must be some sort of monastery. In which case I doubt whoever lives here would appreciate us defiling it with muddy hoof prints."

"If there _is_ anyone here. Come on," Arthur said. He grabbed his horse's reins and led it through the door. Gwaine urged his horse to follow.

"You doing all right, there, Merlin?" Gwaine asked.

"F-f-f-fine."

Gwaine chuffed. "You know you'd be easier to believe if your bones weren't rattling together."

Arthur took them through a wide corridor deeper into the citadel... monastery, whatever it was... and still with not a soul to be found.

"They must have fled while they had the chance," Gwaine said. The hallway was lit with torches, some of them guttering down to stumps. "Before the storm hit. They must have been mad or desperate to leave in the middle of winter."

"If it was a matter of being under attack this place would still be occupied but by the enemy," Arthur said. "That it's not is even more worrisome."

It took a bit of searching, going from wide halls to narrow halls back to wide, but they eventually found the wing dedicated to housing whoever had lived here. There were plenty of rooms to choose from, sparse save for a few books, some candles and bedding. The candles weren't lit, which for some reason made Merlin feel better – as though these rooms had not yet been touched.

Whatever the reason for this place's abandonment, it didn't deter Gwaine and Arthur from wasting no time in getting Merlin settled. They had chosen a room with a fireplace, the wood already in the hearth waiting to be lit. Gwaine got a cheery blaze going while Arthur pulled the little wooden bed a little closer to the fire.

"We'll need some water and something for bandages," Arthur was saying as he wrapped Merlin in blankets. Finding the needed supplies would take time, time Merlin could use to warm up. Gwaine was right, Merlin was shivering fit for his bones to knock together.

"I'll go," Gwaine said, getting up.

"Melt snow!" Merlin said.

Gwaine paused, eying him oddly. "Eh?"

Merlin swallowed, moistening his aching throat. "Unt-til we kn-know why n-no one is here w-we should b-be careful. N-not eat or d-drink anything f-from here."

Arthur sighed, scraping his hand down his haggard face. "Merlin's right. We've been through having our water tainted and though it didn't leave Camelot abandoned it was not for wont of trying. There's too many possibilities as to why this place looks like it's just been emptied."

"I'll still need something to carry snow in," Gwaine said.

"If anyth-thing was tainted," Merlin said. "It w-would be the f-food and wat-ter only. N-not p-p-pots and p-pans. M-much easier."

Gwaine nodded once and left, sword in hand. Arthur seated himself at the foot of the bed next to Merlin and stared into the fire. Shadows danced across his face.

"I'm sorry," he said.

Merlin looked at him, one eyebrow raised. "What f-for?"

"For not coming sooner."

Merlin thought back to the day he had been taken, so many weeks ago it was like a dream to him, now – a persistently bad dream, but dampened by time and all the things that had followed. He furrowed his brow. "You were injured, w-weren't you?"

Arthur rubbed his shoulder as though the reminder had brought back the pain. "An arrow to the shoulder. The knights searched for you but slavers know how to cover their tracks. And even with Cenred no longer ruling, his lands are still dangerous for anyone in Camelot to enter. We knew our only choice would be to infiltrate the auction itself."

"And you c-came yourself. Arthur, th-that auction is d-dead center of C-Cenred's land."

"Hence the disguise," Arthur said with exasperation like it should have been obvious, his hand sweeping down himself.

Merlin chuffed, his shivers on the decline. "You c-came all the way deep into Cenred's land, d-dressed like a servant while Gwaine got to be a lord. For _m-me_." He eyed Arthur askance. "You d-do know that this means you can never say you d-don't c-care about me. And _don't_ say it was because my replacement was rubbish at p-polishing your armor."

"No, actually," Arthur said stiffly. "He was rubbish at everything else."

Merlin laughed. It hurt but he didn't care. "You are..."

Arthur narrowed his eyes.

"... far less of a prat than you would have me believe," Merlin finished fondly.

Arthur cuffed him across the back of the head, but as light as he had tried to make it, it was like the first stone of an avalanche, or stepping on a tail in a room full of spooked cats, the pain rippling through Merlin's body until he was curling into himself.

Arthur was immediately in front of Merlin, his face tight and gaunt with worry.

"Merlin?"

"S'all right. S'passing," he gasped.

Arthur cupped his hand to the back of Merlin's head and held it there, but looked at the door. "Where the hell is Gwaine with that water?"

~oOo~

Gwaine was already starting to miss being a lord. Well, a lord over Arthur since technically he was a lord and wasn't exactly fond of it. So what he really missed was lording over Arthur – he chuckled to himself at the pun. Once in Cenred's lands – or former lands, however you wanted to look at it – they'd had to keep up appearances, and it had been _fun_. He didn't even care that Arthur was going to put him through one hell of a pace during training once they were home, the image of Arthur stumbling through the woods gathering firewood was worth it for the mental entertainment value alone.

But he had to give his royal whiny-ness credit where credit was due – no other king would have done what Arthur had done, not for a servant. Gwaine might not be a fan of nobles but, damn it, it was hard not to respect Arthur. They'd gotten Merlin back like he'd promised, and they had even got a bit of a skirmish out of it.

Gwaine retraced their steps, having spotted something like a kitchen halfway to the living quarters. Low and behold, there it was, just on the other side of a wide arched entry, its heavy doors opened flushed against the wall. It was a nice kitchen, Gwaine had to say. Nothing fancy like Camelot's kitchen but it had what they needed and then some if they didn't have to worry about tainted food.

Gwaine frowned as he rummaged through the many cupboards and drawers. The larders were decently stocked, not to mention neatly arranged. Gwaine wasn't an expert on fleeing a permanent home on a moment's notice (an inn or tavern, yes, but then that's why he carried little with him) but he was quite sure that if one were fleeing as a matter of avoiding capture, then one would leave the kitchens a bloody mess trying to grab what food they could before anyone else.

That was the real problem with this place – not that it was abandoned, but that it didn't _look_ abandoned. It looked like everyone had stepped out for a bit of fresh air and got lost, _all at the same time_. A chill went down Gwaine's spine like the tip of a knife.

An airy whisper behind him made him go rigid. Gwaine's grip tightened on his sword. He rose, slowly, from the cupboard he'd been rummaging through. He backed up a step, put weight on his heel and pivoted sharply around, sword raised.

There was no one there.

Gwaine relaxed with a snort. "Great. Not even a half hour in this place and I'm already going mad." He wasn't normally one to make a hasty retreat – not if he could help it - but in this case he would make an exception. He found a good sized pot and grabbed it. There were two small, wooden doors in the kitchen, one that opened to the pantry and the other rattling against the wind. Gwaine went through the one rattling and smiled to see a nice pile of snow gathered against the wall outside. He pulled on his gloves he kept tucked in his belt and used the snow to scrub out the pot, lifting his head every so often to glance into the courtyard, because empty didn't equate safe. Usually the opposite, from his experience. He noted what looked to be some kind of barn not far from the door and made a mental note of it. Maybe the human food was tainted but he couldn't imagine why anyone would go to the trouble to poison animals.

Although maybe it was best not to test that assumption.

Pot as scrubbed as his cold body cared to deal with, Gwaine filled it with snow and lugged it back inside.

He just shut the door when he heard it – that airy whisper like someone trying to catch his attention. Gwaine stilled, straining his ears.

"Hello?" he called.

No one answered. The whispering had stopped.

A shadow flitted across the kitchen entrance. Gwaine ran at it even with his hands still occupied by the pot. He leaped outside hoping to catch the source of the shadow before it vanished.

The hallway – the very long hallway – was empty.

It was time for another retreat. Gwaine hoped this didn't become a habit.

TBC...

A/N: Apologies for Ch. 1 coming and going. I'm not sure what was up with that and there didn't seem to be anything I could do other than wait for to get it's act together.


	3. Chapter 3

Ch. 3

Gwaine, Arthur had to admit, had very good timing. He'd been ready to go look for the knight himself, make sure he hadn't stumbled onto the wine cellar and disregarded Arthur's warnings in a fit of glee. The man wasn't the perpetual drunk he led others to believe but he did have a weakness for good mead and well-aged wine.

It had absolutely nothing to do with being concerned. Nothing at all. Even when the man in question shouldered his way through the door and Arthur released a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding.

"Fresh melting snow," Gwaine announced with a triumphant grin. "And... well... not bandages. I'm thinking it's a towel but it was all I could find." He shrugged the arm covered by the towel. "But it was clean and folded, and from the look of this place I'd say cleanliness was next to holiness."

"About time," Arthur said, and took the pot to set it by the fire. "From how long you took you had me wondering if you'd met a barmaid on the way."

Gwaine, ripping the towel into bandages, bounced his eyebrows. "Now wouldn't that have been a treat." Then he looked at Merlin tipped over onto his side, and frowned. "Is he asleep?"

"No," Merlin croaked. He struggled upright. Gwaine abandoned his task to help him.

Gwaine had packed the pot with snow, but melted it didn't seem all that much. It would have to do and it wasn't like they didn't have plenty.

"Get his shirt off," Arthur said.

Undressing was always a thankless task when injured. Because Merlin needed the shirt (ragged and useless as it was in Arthur's opinion) they couldn't merely cut it off. But Gwaine was a man who knew what he was doing, perhaps a skill he picked up from his wanderings and penchant for angering the wrong people. Arthur watched as the knight bunched the shirt up Merlin's torso, eased it over his head then slid it over his out-stretched arms. Merlin barely winced the entire time.

Arthur was then distracted by the state of his manservant's body. He knew the cruelty of the slave traders – he had divested them of enough slaves to have deduced their methods without ever having to see it first hand – but there was a difference when the damage was on the body of someone you knew. And up close... lords it was horrible: the bruises as though Merlin had been splashed with the colors of sickness and decay, cut through with thin, angry lines of red and striated with dried blood and filth. If they'd fed Merlin at all, it had been very little or next to nothing. It was not emaciation, nothing that complete, but Merlin's bones had always seemed close to the surface and now the majority of them were showing with a clarity that couldn't be called normal. The sharp visibility of Merlin's ribs, like some horrible cage for a delicate bird, twisted Arthur's stomach.

The men had been toying with Merlin when Arthur had found them, like a cat with a mouse, laughing at him when he stumbled and cried out in pain. The rage Arthur had felt on seeing it... the last time he had felt such anger was when the old wizard had killed his father.

Three weeks. Merlin had been at the mercy of those _slavers_ for three weeks. Arthur had lain wounded and helpless for three weeks, and even now his shoulder still twinged fiercely. Gaius had said it would take more than weeks to heal but Arthur hadn't cared. He was going to find Merlin, whatever it took.

Which, in retrospect, hadn't been particularly logical. Gwaine could have gone with any one of the knights and brought Merlin home. There had been no reason for Camelot's king to go. But damn logic, Arthur had said. It was his fault Merlin had been taken in the first place, his fault for bringing him along on that stupid hunt so far from home, and his fault he had been unable to protect him. This wasn't about logic. This was about setting right a terrible wrong.

Arthur dipped one of the strips Gwaine had ripped into the bucket, wrung it, then moved to Merlin to begin cleaning some of the cuts, the deepest on his chest, ribs and across his shoulder blades. Gwaine set about poking Merlin in search of broken bones, much to Merlin's consternation. Being poked and prodded when broken and bruised might as well be a form of lesser torture, though Merlin made little complaint beyond hisses and grunts.

"Ribs it looks like," Gwaine said. "But not much else. Good, less to bind." He pulled his dagger from his boot. "Now those damn chains."

But no matter how Gwaine dug at the locks, the manacles wouldn't budge, and the effort was only causing Merlin more pain. Hisses and grunts turned into choked whimpers and shakes.

"Enough. We'll deal with them back at Camelot," Arthur said harsher than intended.

Gwaine held up his hands in surrender, then stowed his knife. Merlin pulled his hands to himself, cradling them against his concave stomach. Arthur hadn't missed the angry red skin beneath the metal.

Other than his hands and the various controlled noises of discomfort, Merlin kept perfectly still and unnervingly quiet. It made cleaning him easier but it bothered Arthur. Merlin was not one to pass up an opportunity for commentary, such as the king possibly apprenticing with Gaius or some protest on how Merlin could clean his own wounds, thank you very much. Arthur reminded himself that Merlin was no doubt tired, and cold. Even sitting up he looked half asleep.

_You just miss the sound of my voice_. That's what Merlin would say if he could read Arthur's thoughts.

It wasn't normal, that was all – Merlin not talking. It wasn't normal and it was making Arthur nervous, making him wonder if there might be something else wrong, something internal that was draining Merlin's life away, something in his mind that made him never want to talk again. Arthur had rescued slaves. He knew the damage.

"Merlin?" Arthur said.

"Hm?" Merlin replied.

"Are you hungry? We were able to trade two rabbit skins for some bread and cheese before we arrived at the auction camp. You should try to eat while you can."

"Mm," Merlin said, his eyes barely open.

With Merlin's chest wrapped Arthur focused on the chafed wrists. He cleaned them under the manacles, wrapped them, protecting them as best he could while the shackles remained. Both he and Gwaine decided to wait for when Merlin was a little stronger before splitting the chains. The chains were long enough so there would be no hindrance to Merlin's movements, no reason to cause him any more discomfort.

Sometime during the cleaning and binding Gwaine had filled their water skins with melted snow. It left little water in the pot, and that meant needing more, especially since the horses had yet to drink. Gwaine didn't look particularly happy about it.

"You're not scared," Arthur said with a half-smirk. He saw, out of the corner of his eye, Merlin's lips twitch toward a smile around a small mouthful of bread. Good, a smile was good, even a small one.

Gwaine's snort was paled by the trepidation in his eyes. "It's the wind. Plays tricks with the ears," he said, but as though more to himself than to Arthur. It took Gwaine what felt like nearly a whole minute before he finally leave the room.

Gwaine wasn't normally a man all that fond of hesitation.

But neither was he a man who stayed silent about potential problems. If something was wrong, Gwaine would say, and until then Arthur wasn't going to worry about it. He turned his attention back to Merlin to coax some cheese into him.

"It's not the wind," Merlin said.

Arthur blinked. "What?"

"Gwaine has a right to be nervous." Merlin huddled deeper into himself. "Nothing about this place feels right."

"Obviously. It's been abandoned, _very recently_. What about that could possibly feel even remotely right?"

Merlin, too weary to deal with Arthur's usual sarcasm, shrugged and continued eating. He managed three bites of bread and one bite of cheese before both pieces of food were falling out of his limp hands. Arthur took them and placed them in his satchel. He then helped ease Merlin onto his back and covered him to his neck.

"Rest," Arthur said. "This place may not feel right but it's warm, and Gwaine and I are here. You're safe."

Merlin grunted his understanding, already drifting off. Arthur was left to listen to the snap of the fire, the moan of the wind and the snow softly pattering against the window pain above the bed. He looked at Merlin, studied his gaunt and angular face and the slow motions of his chest. The idiot had been running toward him when the slavers took him, running and yelling, heedless of the danger around him, because Arthur had fallen with an arrow in his shoulder.

Lords, Merlin was always doing that, wasn't he? Cowering behind a tree one moment then not giving a damn about the danger the next. He was odd, and irritating, and yet none of that ever seemed to matter because Arthur couldn't begin to imagine what life would be like if Merlin wasn't there. He could barely remember what life had been like before Merlin had come. And just the thought of Merlin – clumsy, idiotic Merlin with his guileless smiles and impertinence and eternal optimism and kindness – in the hands of those slavers, beaten and starved and toyed with while barely able to stand, made Arthur sick to his stomach.

As with being unable to imagine life before Merlin, Arthur couldn't imagine having not come to find him. There were some things in life you had to do, and damn the sense of it, or lack thereof. As much as Arthur missed his father, a small part of him was glad Uther wasn't around to see this. He would have put Arthur in the dungeon for it. Or, worse, the stocks. Kings don't risk themselves for a mere servant, he would say, and then he would wonder why that crucial bit of wisdom refused to be branded into Arthur's skull.

Arthur was rudely interrupted from his thoughts by the nervous nicker of a horse. Arthur glanced at Merlin, satisfied to see him deeply asleep. He went to the door and peered out at the two horses still parked in the hall. Their ears were back, the whites of their eyes showing, but like the war horses they were, they were not inclined to leave unless instructed to do so. Arthur went to them and patted their necks.

"I suppose we're not the only ones who find this place wrong," he said.

Which was... unsettling. One more unsettling to add to the ever growing pile. Because animals weren't bothered by anything unless they had a reason to be bothered. Arthur glanced in either direction of the torch-lit hall. Still empty as when they'd come in. Arthur turned to go back into the room.

A shadow dashed across his peripheral vision on his left and a horse squealed. Arthur whipped around drawing his sword. But as had been the case and was still the case, there was no one there.

Yet when he looked at the horses, they were quivering.

A hand clamped itself onto Arthur's shoulder. He yelped and spun around, bringing his sword up.

Gwaine, pot tucked under his arm, took two quick steps back, his free hand raised. He eyed Arthur carefully.

"You're not scared of this place, are you?" Gwaine said with a challenging lift of one eyebrow.

Arthur glared at him. "The horses were spooked. I thought something might be out here."

But Gwaine, still vindictive, smiled saccharine and shouldered his way into the room, leaving Arthur with the horses. Arthur turned his glare on them, instead.

The horses were completely relaxed.

~oOo~

Merlin dreamed in half images – flashes of dark and fleeting shapes like the scattered pieces of a puzzle. They whispered, these images; so many voices undulating in and out, sometimes in the distance, sometimes right next to his ear.

Jimbol was there, sometimes; still a bloody pile of dead man slumped against a tree. The next time he came, clear as though real, he turned his bloodless face and smiled bloodless lips.

"Out of the pan and into the fire, boy," he said. "You escaped nothing."

The sword lashed out drawing a red line beneath Merlin's heart. Blood poured from him in rivers. Someone laughed, but it wasn't Jimbol. He was a pile of bones, now, eaten by time.

_We'll soon have all the time in the world, little warlock. Just you wait. Just you watch._

~oOo~

Arthur reentered the room, feeling ridiculous for having indulged the paranoia of horses and placing them in the neighboring room. Out of sight, out of mind, he reasoned; if there was something skulking about the castle – some cat or dog left behind, or wolf having found its own way in – then the horses wouldn't see it, get spooked and plague Arthur with reasons to check on them every two minutes. He was tired, achy, and in no mood for skittish animals. He was going to have enough on his plate dealing with a, no doubt, skittish manservant, not to mention an already skittish knight.

Speaking of whom, the latter was currently kneeling at the bedside, mopping the face of the former with a wet cloth. Arthur froze in alarm.

"Does he have a fever?" Arthur asked. Just what they needed, a skittish, injured and _sick_ manservant.

"He's warm, but mostly restless. I thought this would help," Gwaine said.

Merlin's head rocked to the side, the muscles of his brow twitching in consternation. It wasn't the frantic motions of fevered nightmares, but it iwas/i a sign of unhappy dreams none the less. As though to confirm this, Merlin moaned – a high, pitiful sound tapering off into a weak whimper.

Arthur went to the fire and stoked it, not because he thought it would help in anyway, but because he felt the need to do _something_. Outside, the storm continued to rage, the wind rattling the window and snow still assaulting the glass. It felt not unlike being under siege.

"The council is never going to let me hear the end of this," Arthur muttered to himself, leaning his elbow against the edge of the mantle.

"For what, going off to save Merlin?" Gwaine said. He chuckled. "What can they do? Dethrone you?"

"They think as my father did. They may not have the authority to lock me in the dungeons as he had but believe me, their never ending attempts to have me emulate my father is bad enough." Arthur rubbed at his eyebrow with his thumb. "They'll prattle on and on about my foolishness for leaving Camelot without a king in order to go after one man who isn't even a noble."

But this only made Gwaine chuckle louder. "They'll think it more of that mad King Arthur's reckoning. First he knights peasants, now he's risking life and limb to save a serving boy. What next, risking life and limb to save kittens from trees?"

"It's not funny, Gwaine," Arthur said even as he fought not to smile. He shrugged. "Although I did save lady Althea's kitten once."

"Was she grateful?" Gwaine asked with a bit of a leer.

"She kissed me on the cheek."

"That's all?"

Arthur gave Gwaine a hooded look. "I was nine and she was five."

"Ah." Gwaine poured all of his focus into cooling Merlin's clammy face. The boy's head had flopped the other way, and his lips moved as though mouthing words.

"I'll happily save any one of you, kitten in trees included," Arthur went on. "But I have to be careful, Gwaine. I give the council enough reason and they could take control over my authority."

Gwaine scoffed. "I doubt saving one manservant is going to lead to your court rebelling, _sire_."

"They'll say I'm being selfish." And Arthur couldn't help but wonder if it was selfish to leave a kingdom for a single person when so many others could have gone in his stead.

"The way I figure it," said Gwaine. "The fact that you rescue kittens from trees and a manservant from slavers puts you as a damn fine king in my book. The masses don't mean much when you see them only as masses. You have to see them as people, as individuals who deserve to live their lives and be rescued just as much as any with noble blood. You care about your people and you show it. To the bog with the council, I say."

Water splashed hollowly in the pot. Gwaine sighed both heavily and pointedly. "_Lovely_. Time to fetch more water. Anything else I should get while I'm out? Oh, wait, that's right – there's a whole larder full of food and we're not supposed to _ouch it_."

Arthur chuffed. "Gwaine, when we return, I swear to prepare a feast the likes of which you will never forget."

"Oh, believe me," Gwaine said, standing with the pot. "Days of rations have made me fondly remember every feast I've ever had. That includes Grandmother Ginny's rabbit stew, and that old hag couldn't cook."

Arthur allowed himself a small chuckle this time. When Gwaine was gone, Arthur pushed himself away from the mantle and took Gwaine's spot by Merlin's side.

~oOo~

"Oh, there was a sweet lass by the old mill road..." Gwaine hummed to himself, filling the silence on his way to the kitchen. He was starting to get used to this empty, strange place. He knew because he was starting to get bored with fetching water, and also starting to get curious as to what else this place had to offer. That is, things to look at, not to take. It was a small castle, at least compared to Camelot, but the workmanship of the tapestries, rugs, even the grate in front of the kitchen fireplace, was enough to make the artisans of Camelot rage with jealousy.

Odd thing was (as though there wasn't enough odd going around) none of the work actually depicted anything. It was all knots and shapes, complicated and lovely but otherwise there to look pretty and nothing more. Gwaine had been around, had seen his share of places of worship when in need of sanctuary against ruffians and barkeeps looking to collect on tabs. There was never any question of which place worshiped what, because the object or objects of worship were depicted everywhere. Even in Camelot, if it wasn't a flag with the Pendragon crest it was a tapestry of a hunt or a sculpture of some long dead king. Even a lowly peasant's home had its trinkets of belief.

But here, in this place that seemed so much like a monastery, there was nothing. It was as though whatever these people had believed in – be it gods or kings or something else – was meant to be hidden from the world.

Or maybe you had to look in the right place - the more sacred a thing, the better it was hidden.

Since it wasn't as though they needed water right away, Gwaine kept going beyond the kitchen. He took careful mental note of where he went, left, then right, checking doors but finding only more bedrooms. A quick trot down the stairs, however, brought him to another arched door, like the kitchen's only wider. Through it was a library.

Gwaine wasn't a fan of libraries, and not for the reason most people thought. It wasn't that they were boring – well, _completely_ boring, he did like a good book now and then. What they were was a reminder; him and his mother curled up in their meager little cottage, a tattered book in hand, Gwaine's young mind struggling with difficult words and his mother helping him through them. They were strange memories, filling him with warmth only to dampen that warmth with pain. There had eventually, too soon, come a time when he had only himself to teach him to read.

Gwaine would have moved on, but if the artwork of a place didn't tell you about it, then the books surely would. Gwaine entered, pot still in hand, following the wooden shelves packed with books along the wall. These people must have been exceptionally well off to have so many books.

Gwaine's heart slowly sank. He was no expert, but he knew enough to know that some of the symbols on the spines were symbols normally associated with magic.

"Oh, this is not good."

Of course neither could he really call it bad. They were in Cenred's land, after all, where magic wasn't forbidden. Had this been Camelot then, yes, definitely time to panic that there was a fortress filled with magic books in a place where magic was outlawed. Here, it was just a place with magic books.

Gwaine chuckled as he imagined sorcerers, dozens of them, accidentally turning themselves into frogs or enchanting themselves into skipping off into the snow. Or, hell, maybe they got drunk on magically enhanced wine and decided to go dancing naked to celebrate the winter solstice, forgetting about the "winter" part and the "solstice-still-two-weeks-away" part.

Either way, where there was magic, and a mysteriously empty castle, there had to be magic gone awry. That meant that the castles abandonment was the fault of whoever owned this place. That meant they probably had nothing to worry about. Shaking his head at the sundry hilarious what-ifs that popped into his brain, Gwaine moved to one of the books open on one of the many tables and flipped idly through it. Poetry for the most part, fancy words written in fancy lettering full of thous, thees, and other various big, flowery script._ He bringeth forth yonder light of the fallen sun. As the halo embraceth the shadowed moon doth he embraceth the lovers of his will. He keepeth the door, and the key within us doth he need to open the way. The Place We Do Not Name. The soul doth burn to speak it. We come to him._

Gwaine flipped the page and grimaced. On the other side of the poem was an image, hand-drawn in ink by a particularly disturbed individual, though Gwaine had to give the bloke credit for skill. The thing was like a giant snake with four arms, a pair of bat wings and a long neck topped with something like a ram's skull, only with very uncomfortably sharp teeth. Its four arms were spread, like it was waiting for a hug.

"Don't think I want to be 'embraceth' by that any time soon, thank you much." Gwaine snorted, easing the book shut. He turned to the door.

A great mass of furless skin and solid muscle barreled into Gwaine, knocking him into the bookshelves, and the pot fell with a clang. It was only thanks to years of spontaneous bar room brawls and hunting trips gone wrong that Gwaine's hand went immediately to the great jaws of serrated teeth and held them open and away from his throat. At the same time, he wedged his foot into the things stomach and shoved it back. The sudden shift in weight and his hands still keeping the jaws pried apart dropped both man and beast to the floor. Gwaine immediately rolled away, landed on his feet and pulled his sword from its sheath. The beast found its footing and took a flying leap, right into Gwaine's blade. The thing snarled once, then slid from the blade and crumpled to the floor in a dead heap.

Gwaine stumbled back into the table for support as he gave his body time to remember how to breathe. The need to breathe was mostly forgotten when he got his first real look at the thing that had tried to rip his throat out.

"What the bloody fires of the underworld is that?" he muttered. It was the epitome of ugly, whatever it was – like a wolf... no, a giant boar. A giant boar with mange and a smashed face – not unlike that mean little lap whelp his aunt Millie had liked to keep tucked in her arm, bug-eyes included. But its nose was piggish, its tusks putting to shame a real boar and its claws like curved daggers that could reach all the way to a man's heart.

And it was red. Blood red. More than blood red, it looked as though it's skin had been removed to show off just how bulging and impossible all those muscles were.

Then it vanished, fading like morning mist until not even the blood remained.

"Oh that is not right," Gwaine quavered. He scraped a hand down his face and realized he was trembling. He hurried from the room at a run.

He was right; there was magic gone awry in this place.

"But couldn't damn well have been them dancing naked in the snow," he grunted to himself in between panting breaths. "Course not. That would have been too _bloody _easy."

TBC...


	4. Chapter 4

A/N: A bit of mild gore in this one, specifically the first couple of paragraphs. You have been warned.

Ch. 4

"The problem is, boy," said dead Jimbol, helping himself to a red apple – or what looked like an apple. But instead of crunching, when Jimbol bit into it, it _squelched_. Instead of juice running down his decaying skin, it was blood. "Is that for all this talk of bringing magic back to the land, you're doing a piss poor job of it. You need your kingy to do it but you've gone and made him hate magic. What's worse, he's fragile as a little lamb. Armor and swords don't make a man immortal, and there's worse things than love potions and questing beasts out there."

Jimbol spat out a wad of bloody apple. It landed at Merlin's feet, lumpy and flesh-like and _pulsating_.

It wasn't an apple.

Jimbol tapped the not-apple against his balding head. "You should be knowing things, lad. It should be coming to you, clear as day." He shrugged, and said around another sloppy, smacking bite, "S'not your fault, I suppose, not with them magic chains on. But, still, really." He gave Merlin a disgusted look, then shook his head at the not-apple. "Fine piece of work he is, right? Most powerful warlock, and little chains are stifling him. He escapes with the snap of his fingers and still needs his little kingy to go rescue him. And what does that do? Puts his little kingy and his little knight in the wrong place at the worst possible time."

Merlin opened his mouth to demand what Jimbol was talking about, why he felt so wrong, what was going on. All that came out was a choked croak, like the chains had stifled his voice along with his magic.

"You're a wreck, boy," Jimbol went on. "A wreck and a mess and not much use to your kingy. The man that was this body did a fine job of it. All you can do is watch. Watch while I bleed one of your little friends dry." He winked at Merlin. "Care to choose which it'll be?"

There was a scream. Arthur. No, Gwaine. No, it was Arthur, it was... Jimbol took a bite of not-apple, then he laughed, blood spraying from his mouth.

Merlin snapped upright with a gasp that caught in his lungs, choking him. He coughed until he thought his ribs would collapse, but when a mailed arm slid across his shoulders, Merlin flinched violently away.

"Merlin. Merlin! Merlin, it's all right. It's me, it's Arthur. Listen to me, you need to breathe. Just slow down and focus on breathing."

The arm returned, but the familiarity of the voice made it welcome. Merlin felt himself pulled against Arthur's chest where the pattern of the king's own breathing gave Merlin's lungs a rhythm they could follow. The wooden head of a water skin was pressed to his lips and he took the liquid like he hadn't had any for days.

"Better?" Arthur asked when the flask was pulled away.

Merlin nodded. "Better."

"Good. Because if you die after all the work I put into rescuing you I _will_ follow and drag you back to the world of the living... by your ear. Understood?"

Merlin managed a small smile. "Don't you mean... all the work you and Gwaine... put into rescuing... me?" It was difficult to talk with lungs still hungry for air. But he no longer felt like he was dying, and that was what mattered.

Arthur arranged the single, flat pillow against the headboard and eased Merlin against it. Merlin wasn't the only one picking up a few healing tricks from Gaius. Sitting upright – or at least mostly upright – eased much of the pressure off his chest, and his lungs were finally... not content, but certainly less combative.

"Semantics," Arthur said. "Most of it was my plan. I had to play the servant, remember. He had me fetching blasted firewood."

"Poor you," Merlin said, chuckling. He clutched his side. "Don't make me laugh, please, it hurts."

"It wasn't meant to be funny, _Mer_lin," Arthur said dryly. He adjusted the blanket around Merlin's shoulders. "You are such a..." he sighed. "Never mind."

Merlin lifted an eyebrow, or tried to. Lords, was there at least one inch of his body that didn't hurt?

"This. Is. Amazing," he said. "You really can't give me the respect I deserve unless I have a foot over death's door."

Arthur scoffed. "That's the key word, Merlin – _deserve_. See, you believe you always deserve my respect but I'm the one who decides who deserves what. Which, mostly, you don't deserve anything." He pointed a finger at Merlin. "And that last time was only because I really did think you were dying."

"And you think I'm not dying now?"

"No."

"So I don't deserve a little respect?"

"No."

Merlin pressed his lips into a thin line. "You were about to call me idiot and you didn't."

"Do you want me to? Because I will. _Gladly_."

"No, no. I'm fine." Merlin smirked.

Arthur rolled his eyes. "I liked you better when you were asleep. Speaking of which-"

"No!" Merlin cut in, sharp and desperate and a hair's breadth away from panic. He cleared his aching throat. "I mean... I think I've had enough sleep for now."

Arthur studied him carefully and with painfully obvious skepticism. "Funny, because it looks as though your eyelids would like nothing more than to slide shut."

"I don't want to sleep!" Merlin snapped, and instantly regretted it as one often did when inadvertently betraying a truth they were trying to avoid.

Arthur's skepticism changed places with something softer, and dare Merlin say, almost kinder.

"Bad dreams?"

Merlin hunched into the blanket until his shoulders were up somewhere around his ears. "Something like that."

"About what?"

"Where's Gwaine?"

"Fetching water. Don't change the subject-"

Merlin shuddered. "He shouldn't have gone alone." His eyes tracked the room, feeling as though the source of his dreams had been here, had gone, but were he to look closely enough he would find traces of them having loitered close by, unseen.

Them, not him. Not Jimbol. Except it was Jimbol. Only Jimbol wishing to finish what he started and torturing Merlin any way he could. Except there was no Jimbol because he was dead. Arthur had killed him. Arthur, whose scream continued to echo in Merlin's head. Or was it Gwaine's scream?

"You shouldn't have come," Merlin blurted.

Arthur frowned. "What?"

"You shouldn't have come for me. You shouldn't..." Merlin glared at Arthur. "You're the damn king, it was too dangerous!"

Arthur's head reared back, his expression like one regarding a stranger who had just insulted his parentage.

"Excuse me?" Arthur said, tone clipped and cool. "If I hadn't rescued your skinny, useless hide you would be dead. Or worse. See, Merlin, this is why I have a difficult time showing you respect. You have yet to _earn_ it."

But Merlin shook his head all throughout Arthur's reprimand and continued to shake it. "Too dangerous. I'm not worth it, it was too dangerous."

Arthur exhaled, then pinched the bridge of his nose.

"I'm sorry," Merlin said, his voice small and contrite, though he didn't know why he was apologizing. He'd meant it, every word. Arthur shouldn't have come and he shouldn't be here, not this place that felt so wrong it was like a waking nightmare. But then he thought of Jimbol, of those nights sitting huddled in the cage wagon, cold, hungry, hurting, the bite of the whip across his spine, the crack of a fist across his face or a boot to his back, and he couldn't help being selfish.

He couldn't help not caring who had rescued him.

"I'm sorry," he said again, rocking back and forth. Sorry for being ungrateful. Sorry for being grateful. Sorry that Arthur had come. Sorry that he had wanted Arthur to come.

A hand on his shoulder made him stop.

"It's all right, Merlin. Don't worry about it," Arthur said, sounding very tired.

Merlin rubbed his grubby sleeve across his dripping nose. Then he dug the heel of his hands into his eyes before the moisture had a chance to fall. "I'm sorry, I'm just... if you want to call me a girl, feel free to, I I think I actually deserve it this time." He said this with a chuckle that he didn't really feel up to.

"I'll save it for when you truly deserve it," Arthur said kindly. "You've been through hell, Merlin. I've known knights who have suffered less and barely managed."

Merlin chuffed. "Is that a note or respect I hear?"

Arthur's lips curled into a half smile. "Not at all. What in the world would give you that idea?" He ruffled Merlin's hair.

Merlin pulled away, feigning annoyance. He averted his gaze to the blanket, licking his lips nervously. "You are right. I wouldn't have gotten far if you hadn't come. Which is why... I was wondering, sort of... if maybe, perhaps, I should take some kind of lessons."

"Lessons?"

"Yeah. Something self-defense related. Or maybe learn to handle a sword better. You know, beyond merely being able to hold it up long enough to keep you from pummeling me during practice." _Because sometimes having magic is pointless because I can't use it. And how will I protect you if I can't even._.. "...protect myself. To protect myself," Merlin finished.

Arthur shrugged. "I suppose there is no harm in it." And it said so much that Arthur tacked nothing on about clumsiness, or Merlin accidentally impaling himself, or impaling Arthur. It said that he truly was worried. It said that he understood. And it said that, no matter how much he attempted to say otherwise, that he did respect Merlin. Arthur may have been a prat who liked to throw things at Merlin, but he was an honorable prat. Sometimes, he was even just honorable.

"Thank you," Merlin said, meaning it.

Arthur responded with a quick nod and an averted gaze, which said he was being kind but in about ten seconds he was going to do something prattish.

"Where is that mead-addicted oaf with the bloody water already?" Arthur said.

_And_ there it was.

Arthur went to the door and peered out, as though the physical act of checking would make their wayward knight reappear.

Merlin shivered when the door was opened. The sense of wrongness to this place seemed to increase without a barrier between them and the corridor beyond. It was a strange sensation, like a whisper or some half-remembered thought that was important but refused to surface.

It was the chains. It had to be. It was stifling more than simply his magic, and he knew – without a shadow of a doubt – that were he to remove the chains then whatever he was almost-sensing would smother him like a flood of arctic water.

It wanted to smother him. It was waiting to. That's what it felt like – a thing beyond the door, pawing at the crack between the barrier and the floor.

Merlin shrank back. "We really shouldn't be in this place."

Arthur huffed. "Yes, Merlin, you've told me I don't know how many times already. And I would have happily obliged to the request were it not for the _raging blizzard outside_." Arthur stepped back and shut the door. Merlin felt only a fourth of the way toward better.

"Maybe I should go and look for him," Arthur said, neutral but with the far-away stare of indecision. Merlin couldn't blame him. On the one hand, Gwaine had been gone far too long in a castle that felt too many kinds of wrong. On the other, feeling selfish again, Merlin didn't want to be left alone. Neither did he want Arthur to be just as "taking too long," as Gwaine.

Arthur stood there, staring at Merlin with a look of concentration that usually accompanied a bout of internal warfare.

But then the decision was made for him. Gwaine burst through the door then slammed it shut with his back pressed like a barrier against it. He was pale, sweaty, panting, his sword in hand – the very picture of a man who had just seen a ghost that turned out to be a dorocha.

"We need to get out of here," he said.

Gaping, Arthur swung his hand toward the window then toward Merlin. "Blizzard and injured man! Remember?"

Gwaine deflated. "Oh... damn. Then we need to barricade ourselves in." He didn't wait for any comment when he was dragging the little writing table in front of the door, followed immediately by the stool.

"Gwaine," Arthur said carefully as if talking to a mad man, but his eyes were on the door and his hand going to his sword. "I hope you have a good reason for locking us in."

"Oh you bet you're expensive crown I do," Gwaine said, and the wild look in his eyes was making Merlin feel as twitchy as when Arthur had the door open. "This place is a bloody enchanter's mess. I found their bloody library – nothing but magic books."

Arthur stiffened. So did Merlin. That's all they needed – a castle full of missing sorcerers and him without his magic.

"What?" Arthur growled.

"Oh, that isn't the half of it, friends" Gwaine said as he searched the room for more furniture to add to the barrier. "I don't know what those bloody sorcerers did but whatever it was, it must have involved conjuring beasts from some hell dimension. One attacked me. Ugliest thing you will have ever seen and I've seen plenty of ugly in my time. Then I kill the thing and as if it's ugliness wasn't enough, it's body vanishes, blood and all. Complete and utter madness. I'm normally a fan of complete and utter madness but this a little bit much even for me. Vanished! Just... vanished!"

With nothing else but the bed to block the door – and for a moment Gwaine had seemed to consider it – Gwaine stepped back, surveyed his work and shook his head in disgust. "This won't hold, not against such a beast. We need to either leave or find some place more simple to fortify until the storm passes." He began dismantling his barrier.

Arthur grabbed him by the arm and spun him around. "What sort of beast?"

"Did you not just hear me! Ugly! And vanishes when you kill it! But most importantly – _we're not safe here_. I suggest we get the hell away from this place. Since the storm won't let us, we find somewhere with thicker doors or bigger furniture."

"In other words, we stumble around the castle hoping these... beasts don't find us. How is that any more safe?" Arthur demanded.

Gwaine, breathing hard, face still clammy, raked his hand through his hair. He opened his mouth, tilted his head, closed his mouth then tossed up his hands. "It would make me feel better, all right?"

Arthur's head reared back and his face turned thunderous. It was his turn to toss up his hands. "Oh, Excellent reason! To make you _feel_ better. We're to drag Merlin around – who can barely _walk_ - in the hopes of finding a slightly thicker door merely to make you feel better."

Gwaine stepped forward until he was inches from Arthur's face. He said in a voice Merlin had never heard him use before, a voice low and tight and quavering, "If you had seen that beast, you'd be dragging us along looking for the bloody armory. Nothing about it was natural, and I don't trust this room to keep us safe-"

"And I don't trust this entire castle!" Arthur cut in. "This storm cannot last forever. We need to stay here until it passes and leave."

"We're not safe-!"

"Stop it!" Merlin barked, struggling upright despite the pain it caused. But anger was a funny emotion, able to mask even the fiercest agony for a time, and it was a time he was going to use while he could.

Both men fell silent but gave Merlin identical looks of growing impatience. It was confirmation of what Merlin already knew – that this place was wrong. Because a place that was wrong never merely felt wrong, it was a wrongness that manifested itself, whether as disappearing beasts or brave men in desperate need of a place to hide and willing to sacrifice their loyalties for it.

This was Gwaine, for the love of all that was holy – a man who ran toward a fight, who went drinking at the most violent taverns merely for the fun of it, and whose ego was intolerable whenever he killed some enchanted beast.

And he was afraid. Afraid and wanting to run.

"You're not going to get anywhere going at each other's throats except to attract whatever else might be roaming this castle," Merlin said tremulously. Anger might have been lending him strength, but it was a quickly waning strength. "Then it won't matter where we go or what we do, then, will it?"

Merlin's arms gave out and he collapsed on the bed, squeaking out a small cry of pain.

Gwaine and Arthur looked at him, then each other, not chastised but the fact that they had shut up was progress Merlin would take. It was the best he could hope for with everyone on edge.

Suddenly, Arthur shifted, his face going tense and the meat of his fist pressing against the wood of the door. Merlin knew that expression, that stance, painfully well. He lifted his head.

"What? What is it, Arthur?"

"We need supplies."

Gwaine balked, honestly balked, his face draining of color and his eyes going wide. He really was afraid, and it was a look Merlin hoped to never see on him again.

"You want me to go out there, after what nearly happened?"

"No!" Arthur said hotly. "But we're going to need water and... other things."

As in other things such as towels for bandages to keep Merlin's wounds from being infected. Arthur didn't need to say it, and the way his eyes seem to fix themselves on the wall behind Gwaine confirmed it.

"No, we don't," Merlin said.

"Yes, we do," Arthur said. "We have some water left in the skins but there's no saying how much longer this storm will last. And if Gwaine is right, if whatever attacked him is strong enough to get through this door and there's more of them – or something worse... We'll need someplace where we can have space to fight and a way out if needed.

"The Kitchen," Gwaine said, brightening. "It has a door to the outside. It's where I've been gathering snow."

"Does it have a front door?" Arthur asked pointedly.

Gwaine smiled. "Oh, yes. And great wooden things they are, too." Then he frowned. "But Merlin's too weak to move."

"No I'm not," Merlin said, trying to rise.

"Shut up, Merlin. Yes you are," Arthur snapped.

Merlin flopped back onto the bed but glared at Arthur. Arthur ignored him, too busy rolling his eyes as though the answer had been right in front of them the whole time. He tossed up his hands.

"Of course," he said.

The next thing Merlin knew after nearly blacking out several times, he was cocooned in a blanket and cloak on horseback, pressed against the horse's neck to avoid low archways. It was Arthur's horse, with Arthur leading it at the front, Gwaine's horse following obediently behind and Gwaine taking up the rear, muttering to his erstwhile beast that it had better not kick him or it was off to the knackers with it.

If the castle had felt foreboding in the small room, it felt utterly threatening within its halls. The something tugging at Merlin's restrained magic seemed to observe them like a pair of eyes – several pairs, all of them glaring at the intruders and hating them with every fiber of their being. It was a presence that seemed to whisper into Merlin's ears, those whispers trickling coldly down his spine. He was shivering, and not because it was chilly in this place.

Yet there was nothing to see beyond guttering torches and flickering candles. They arrived at the kitchens without incident, and with the horses safely inside, Gwaine and Arthur pulled the great doors closed. The wood groaned and the barrier thumped. Three metal bars that didn't look up to barricading anything against so much as a goat slid with some effort into their slots, and Merlin prayed they weren't as flimsy as they looked.

It took both Arthur and Gwaine to help Merlin from the saddle. Try as they might to be gentle about it, the pain still bordered on intolerable, and Merlin was panting and sweating by the time they eased him to the floor. They had brought the pillow for his head. Merlin wished they could have brought the mattress, the stone floor digging into his bruised bones, making his ribs feel crushed. Gwaine tossed logs of wood from a pile in the pantry into the huge hearth, then lit it with a bit of flint and cotton tinder. Arthur had taken a cauldron and was gathering snow from outside, his head up and in constant motion.

"If I didn't know any better I would say that the storm has gotten worse," Arthur said, placing the full pot next to the hearth to melt. "You can barely see the courtyard."

"Let's just hope nothing saw you," Gwaine said. Just in case, he and Arthur shoved the heavy butcher table in front of the door.

"Feel better?" Arthur said dryly."

Gwaine smirked and patted the table. "Much."

They moved back over to Merlin, Arthur checking the pot and Gwaine adjusting Merlin's blanket.

"How are you faring, Merlin?" Gwaine asked. "Warm enough?"

"I'm getting there," Merlin said, finally feeling the heat of the fire soaking into him. "What about you? You seemed a bit... shaken back there."

Gwaine rested his arms on his knees, pursing his lips. "To be honest..." he shook his head, leaning back on his haunches. "It's funny the things you face in life without batting an eye. I don't think the bloody dorocha scared me half as bad as that thing I faced, and I killed the blasted cur in one go." He frowned, his brow frowning with his mouth. "It's strange. It's like... it's like I knew the thing. Not _knew_ knew like I'd met it before. It was more like I had this sudden thought while it was attacking me, like a knowledge lost to memory until that moment. What I knew, without a doubt, was that I didn't want that thing killing me, because whatever deaths I faced before they would be nothing compared to the death I would face at that creature's claws."

Gwaine scrubbed his face one-handed. "I'll be honest – it terrified the hell out of me. I don't even know what the damn thing was but I knew if it won then what followed would be beyond nightmares."

Arthur, stoking the rising flames, said nothing as he stared into the hearth. He felt it too, Merlin knew – the wrongness of this place.

"What did the beast look like?" Merlin asked. He loathed having to make Gwaine relive that moment, but with information came knowledge, knowledge they could use to hopefully kill any more of these beasts they may come across.

Gwaine did his best to describe it.

"I've never heard of anything like it," Merlin said in horror.

"Because you know every mythical beast in creation," Arthur said dryly.

"Yes," Merlin said, just as dry. "Almost. Thanks to Camelot being a rather favorite target of magical creatures, Gaius is making me memorize the types of creatures we might encounter so I know what to do if I'm gathering herbs and run into one - _again_."

Education was how Gaius liked to show his concern, although after the incident with the griffin he had been more like a task master shoving endless amounts of facts into Merlin's head. Merlin knew just about every mythical creature known to man; it was the subspecies he was still working through. But this dog beast matched nothing he had ever heard of – not the hell hounds that dragged damned souls to the underworld, not the deadly winged ghost dogs of the far north called the kludde, not the black dogs of the moors whose howls heralded Death.

And that was rather unsettling.

"There was a book, there," Gwaine went on. "Where the thing attacked me. It talked of a place called the place we do not name or do not speak of or something. Sounds all nice and lovely 'til you flip the page and see who owns the place." Gwaine shuddered. "Ever heard of it?"

"Could be one of a hundred places. Sorry," Merlin said apologetically. "But I think you're right. I think magic must have gone wrong in this place. Doesn't it feel off to you?"

"It feels _off_ because it's deserted and all the signs say it was recent," Arthur said.

"But it's more than that and you know it," Merlin said irritably, huddling deeper into his blanket.

"And there's nothing we can do about it," Arthur said soberly. "Not until this storm passes."

Merlin sighed tiredly but, lords, he couldn't sleep. He wouldn't.

"Try to get some rest, Merlin," Arthur said, not unkindly.

Merlin shook his head. "I'll dream again."

Gwaine cupped his hand to the back of his head. "We're right here, Merlin. You dream, we'll wake you. Sound fair?" He then ruffled Merlin's hair. Merlin really wished they would stop doing that. He wasn't a blasted child.

Gwaine's promise would have to do, Merlin figured. While his mind begged him to, please, stay awake his body begged him for rest, and it was his body that was the victor. His eyes slid shut no matter how he fought them, and he hoped more than he had hoped for anything that he was too exhausted to dream.

~oOo~

"Poor lad," Gwaine said, keeping his hand on Merlin's head, the dark hair making the boy's face seem near white as the snow, but his eyes sunken in pools of shadow, most especially the right one drowning in a day-old shiner. "Gah, he's right. It's like this place is toying with us." He turned just enough to put Arthur in his sights. "Did he tell you what he was dreaming?"

Arthur, leaning with his elbow on the brick of the hearth, stared into the flames in contemplation. "No. He wouldn't."

"Poor kid," Gwaine whispered. He adjusted the blanket after having already done so, then the pillow making sure Merlin was as comfortable as he could get. There were new bruises on Merlin's face, he noticed, sickeningly dark surrounded by the whiteness of his skin – no doubt received this very day courtesy of the bastard slaver who had been tormenting him. It was near impossible to reconcile Merlin in the clutches of cruelty even with the proof right in front of him, and the proof made him long to run every damn slaver he could find through the gut.

It was funny – Gwaine kept having this feeling that if the slavers had known how friendly and harmless and just plain innocent Merlin was then they wouldn't have taken him. Which was stupid, because the nature of cruelty was that it was just as much the great equalizer as death. Cruelty did not care if you were kindly or a right arse, all it cared about was beating you to a bloody pulp, allowing you to be rescued, but instead of letting you go home safe and sound it dumps you off in some hellish castle full of hellish beasts waiting to give you a fate worse than death. Oh, and you're still shackled and can't bloody move because you're still beaten to a bloody pulp, because there are too many right bastards in this world.

That was cruelty.

Gwaine wondered if Merlin asleep would cut down on the pain of removing the shackles. Gwaine unburied one of Merlin's skinny arms, adjusting the bandage between the manacle and Merlin's damaged wrist. Lords, his arm was thin, like merely touching it would snap it in half, and Gwaine was suddenly loathe to try.

He tried anyway, hating the sight of the damn chains even more. But the moment the blade of his knife began fussing with the lock, Merlin stirred.

"Leave it," Arthur said, still in his contemplative stance.

Gwaine glared at the chains. "They're hurting him and we're not getting out of here any time soon. If there's a way to get them off, then the sooner the better."

"They'll hurt him more if you keep fiddling with them. Let him rest. He needs that more than he needs the damn chains removed."

Gwaine clenched his jaw, but gently tucked Merlin's arm back beneath the blanket, the thrice-be-cursed chains clinking.

"I don't want them on him any more than you," Arthur said quietly.

Gwaine nodded. It was easy to forget, sometimes, that his royal pratness really did give a damn.

The fired popped with a spray of sparks. A voice whispered without words in the subdued silence that followed. Gwaine leaped to his feet, drawing his sword, and heard Arthur do the same.

"So I'm not just hearing things," Gwaine said.

Arthur held a finger to his lips. He moved to the door and pressed his ear against it. Gwaine did the same with the other door, having to half crawl onto the table blocking it to do so. The only sound was the wind.

Until something large, solid and furiously persistent slammed into the kitchen doors.

TBC...

A/N: I would like to take the time to thank everyone for their comments and feedback (because I am terrible about responding to reviews, apologies). The comments are much appreciated :D Reviews feed the muse ;)


	5. Chapter 5

Ch. 5

"I've never cared for destinies," Jimbol said. He was sitting at a table, now - long, charcoal gray, ornate and as decayed as he was – sipping blood-red wine from a black goblet. Merlin sat across from him in a crumbling chair, glaring at him since it was all he was capable of doing.

"Bit too full of themselves, toying with people's lives like that. I mean, you've got a choice but it's never a pretty choice, is it? Succeed and life is posies and roses. Fail and it's endless misery and your possible execution."

Jimbol stared at Merlin over the goblet. He arched a ragged eyebrow, slammed the cup down and laughed.

"Sorry. A bit stupid to assume this destiny of yours all about saving your own neck. Or maybe it is, I don't know." He shrugged and drank greedily, the cup never going empty. "Doesn't really matter one way or the other. But the thing about destinies is you never know where one ends and another begins. Because for all you know the death of all three of you brings about this golden age of yours cause it's your destiny to die. And, in dying, fulfill another destiny. One that's been waiting around for _bloody_ _damn_ _ever_."

Jimbol tossed back more of his drink. It ran from the corners of his mouth down his chin and onto the remains of his shirt. When he finished, he smacked his lips louder and winked at Merlin.

"You thoroughly confused yet? I'd think you'd be used to riddles. You talk to dragons after all and they're so bloody cryptic they'll make your brain bleed. Me, I'm not cryptic. I just like holding all the cards. They're mine to hold, you see. I don't have to tell you squat. And I know you're begging for answers. I can see you screaming for them in every inch of you, but you know what?"

He leaned forward, smiling to make his filmy eyes squint. "I'm not going to tell you."

Somewhere in the shadowy, nameless chamber where the table sat, someone shouted. Someone else shouted back, and in between was a noise like rumbling thunder.

"It doesn't matter, anyway," Jimbol said. "You'll be waking in a minute. I'll be seeing you soon, young Emrys. But," he chuckled, "you're not going to like it." He poured the cup out, blood gushing like from a broken dam and filling the chamber.

~oOo~

The third thud reverberated through the room setting Arthur's teeth on edge. It was just their luck that Merlin decided to not only wake at that very moment, but to wake choking on air.

"Gwaine!" Arthur called.

Gwaine broke from his ready stance by Arthur's side to tend to a flailing, gasping Merlin. Arthur glanced back to see Gwaine gather Merlin to him, pinning him gently to stop him from hurting himself while whispering soothing words. Another violent thud ripped Arthur's attention back to the door.

The wood had cracked, and the bars were beginning to bend. The horses skittered in place nervously.

Another impact and the bars bent another inch. Whatever was throwing itself against the barrier snarled in anger. It wasn't going to stop, not when it was so close to getting in. Arthur shuffled back until he was next to Gwaine and a shuddering Merlin.

"We need to leave," Arthur said. "Gwaine, get Merlin on the horse, I'll get the side door."

If there was one thing Arthur always grudgingly respected about a dilemma, it was the extra strength it gave him to do what otherwise might have been beyond even his endurance. He pushed the heavy table clear of the door and well enough away for the horses to get through.

The moment he did, the door flew open and crashed against the wall. A gust of wind like a massive fist nearly shoved Arthur off his feet. The horses squealed, and then they were charging straight for Arthur, too frightened and mindless to see the living, breathing obstacle in front of them. Arthur dove to the side. The horses barreled past, one clipping the table with its chest, and vanished outside into the blinding blizzard. Arthur scrambled to his feet and ran after them.

"Arthur, no!" Gwaine cried. His words were swallowed by the howling wind. One step outside and the snow was on Arthur like it truly was an attacking army. Arthur threw his hand up to shield his eyes from the stinging snow. There was so much of it, like a solid wall of white, and the horses nowhere to be seen.

A sudden shove to the shoulder and Arthur was spinning around bringing his sword up.

"Arthur!" Gwaine called. "We need to move! It's almost through the door!"

Arthur could barely make out Gwaine's shape and the bundle he was carrying in his arms.

"Keep to the walls! We'll get lost in this if we don't!" Arthur said. "You go first! I'll take the rear should it get through!"

"Right!" Gwaine said.

They pressed their shoulders to the cold wall and slid along it, following its contours to where ever it took them. The wind was a blade cutting straight through Arthur, numbing him down to the marrow of his bones. He gave up glancing behind him. There was no point, the snow too thick and disorienting. There was no way that whatever had been coming through the door would be able to find them in this, Arthur didn't care how powerful or unusual whatever-it-was was.

They stumbled blindly through the curtain of white, going where the curve or bends of the wall coaxed them too. The cutting cold and brutal winds stifled all sense of time, minutes becoming an eternity of endless walking, piling snow drifts soaking into Arthur's pant legs and turning his skin to ice. His hand felt frozen to his sword hilt.

For a moment, in a sickening heartbeat, Arthur wondered if this was how they were to die, forever lost in the cold and the snow, never to be found. All of Camelot, Gwen, the knights, Gaius, left to forever wonder, forever watch the horizon searching for those who would never come.

Arthur coughed out a sob.

"Here! A door! Here!" Gwaine called out sounding as desperate as Arthur felt. His voice was like a slap to Arthur's face, waking him from the veil of dark thoughts that had smothered his mind. There was a thud, followed by the abrupt manifestation of light. Arthur surged forward following the hazy silhouette of Gwaine.

They stumbled like drunks into the warm, golden glow of a stairwell, staggering down the steps and not caring where those steps led as long as it took them far from the storm. Their destination was a chamber, nothing remarkable except for the large hearth roaring with a welcoming fire. On the other side of the chamber was another stairwell.

Gwaine went straight for the hearth and settle Merlin as close to the fire as safely possible, opening the blanket and cloak enough for the heat to reach him. Merlin tried to huddle into a shivering ball. Gwaine wouldn't let him.

"You have to warm up, Merlin," Gwaine said, breathless but smiling like a loon. He chafed Merlin's chest, then arms, then hands to get the circulation flowing and the blood to warm faster. Arthur moved over to them to check on them and to warm himself. He could already start to feel his legs again and was able to release the hilt of his sword. Gwaine was pale from the cold, Merlin practically white, and Arthur didn't need a mirror to know he wasn't any better off. It was like the entire territory right down to the weather was hell-bent on killing them.

"W-w-why did we run?" Merlin asked, teeth chattering.

"Something big and nasty wanted in and it wasn't taking no for an answer," Gwaine said, still warming Merlin's hands in his own.

Arthur glared into the fire, gnawing the inside of his cheek. "I suppose..." he said. "You may have had a point about the door."

Gwaine snorted. "Yeah, I don't think I did. Those kitchen doors were strong, solid. I think at this point no door will be our salvation."

"And we can't leave," Arthur said darkly.

"Then if this place does have an armory we should find it. Stock up on what we can and hold out for as long as we can," Gwaine said.

Arthur rubbed at his chin with the edge of his finger. He found it odd, cruelly ironic even that everything he had wanted to avoid was happening against their will, as though there were something listening in on them and using what they said to decide the rules of its sick game. Arthur looked to Gwaine and Merlin, Gwaine still in the process of warming Merlin, Merlin looking right back at Arthur, guilt like a pinched mask over his face.

Of course the idiot would be feeling guilty. Arthur hated that he was because, damn it, it had been Arthur's choice to go, and like he told Gwaine he would damn well have gone for anyone of his men regardless of status or how much they annoyed the hell out of him. But unfortunately now wasn't the time to get that through Merlin's thick skull, and not that he would listen, anyway. Merlin had a guilt complex bigger than Camelot.

And right now Arthur needed to get him and that over-sized guilt complex somewhere safe. They could worry about how the hell to get out of this place later.

"We need to go," Arthur said, pushing away from the fire. "Gwaine, take Merlin. Merlin, let him carry you without whining about it. I'll take the lead."

Either Merlin was too exhausted to disobey Arthur's orders or too exhausted to complain. The only sound from him as Gwaine gathered him up was a small, pained grunt, followed by a weary sigh. It looked awkward, Gwaine cradling such a long body, and yet Gwaine moved as though Merlin weighed nothing at all. Arthur took position in front of them with his sword in both hands. They took the stairs on the other side of the room that spiraled down into shadows. Those shadows were chased away by torches and another roaring fire of yet another, empty chamber. The stairs on the other side of this room spiraled up.

"This place is a bloody maze," Gwaine hissed.

But since the stairs were the only choice they had, they followed it. It went longer than the last set, Arthur was sure of it, taking them past two landings that a quick look revealed more chambers, more doors, more stairs going up and down. Gwaine was right, this place was a maze, and the deeper they went the more lost they became.

They came to the top of the steps and a room about the size of Gaius' chambers, but painfully sparse – two empty bookshelves, three tables under three stained glass windows, a small fireplace and that was it. There were more bloody stairs, but wooden and leading up to a trap door. The stained glass made it near impossible to see out the windows but Arthur didn't need to in order to know they were at the topmost parts of the castle, possibly a tower or that trap door leading to a tower.

"Is this how it's going to be?" Gwaine said. " Checking every blasted room this place has and hope we find something suitable?"

But there was no challenge to his voice, only a resigned weariness, stating a fact rather than arguing the inevitable. And he was right – again - this was how it was going to be; wandering from stair to hall to room until they either found somewhere to hole up or ran into another of Gwaine's demon dogs.

Arthur stared at the stairs leading to the trap door. They were more like a ladder, really, too steep for the beast to use it and still have enough leverage to slam it's body into the door. But the desire to find an armory pulled at Arthur. A door would only hold for so long but with weapons – crossbows especially – they could build traps, fortify the barrier beyond mere locks.

He took note of the trapdoor and it's location, just in case. The more they knew of this place's structure the more they would be at an advantage. Right now, he counted them lucky that it was only a scattering of beasts they had to contend with. Strong beasts capable of knocking down a sturdy door, but few and far between or they would have ran into more by now.

Arthur turned back to the door, Gwaine with him, Merlin a quiet bundle in Gwaine's arms. Arthur had his foot on the first step when he paused.

"Do you hear something?" he said.

Both men stilled their breathing and listened. They didn't have to. The noise in question was close and coming closer – the unmistakable clatter of running footsteps, and something snarling.

"Back up, back up!" Arthur hissed. They clamored away from the stairwell just as the first source of the footsteps materialized around the turn.

It wasn't a beast, not unless some of them could walk upright and dress in cloaks. But the hand holding the wickedly curved blade was most definitely human flesh. The rest was hidden within a cowl and cape of black with impossible designs stitched in gold. Arthur, battle trained since he could walk, took everything about this man in at a glance. Then the man was on him, and he wasn't alone.

Arthur heard before swords began to clash Merlin yelling, "Put me down so you can fight, Gwaine! Now!" Then there was only the battle, the harsh vibrations of their swords, the solid movement of Arthur's arms, every footstep they took, every parry and attack they made. Arthur's opponent was decent with a blade but his attacks were frenzied, wild, an attack meant to drive the other back into a corner for a quick kill. But whoever this man was he was small, lighter than Arthur, an advantage when it came to footwork and eluding an enemy but this man was relying on brute force, and it was a mistake.

A lunge when the man should have parried, and Arthur drove home for the kill with a deep slice through the belly. It freed Arthur long enough to glance back and see Gwaine holding his own with the second man and Merlin, having lost the blanket but still wrapped in the cloak, staying smartly out of the way in the far corner, Gwaine's dagger gripped tight in his hand.

Merlin's eyes rounded over when they met Arthur's gaze. "Arthur, look out!"

Arthur swung around, raising his sword just in time to block the blow of his next opponent, another cloaked assailant, another idiot using strength he didn't have. Arthur mirrored the man's tactic and drove him back instead.

The man changed tactics, finally getting it through his head that he was going about things all wrong. He ducked Arthur's swing and danced back, light on his feet. His moves became defensive, ducking whatever Arthur gave him and only going in when he thought he saw an opening. The tables had turned and it was all Arthur could do to avoid being sliced himself.

The man went in for another attempt at a hit, swinging low as though to give Arthur a taste of his own medicine with a cut to the gut. But the man must have overreached. He suddenly stumbled, staggering sideways and scrambling fast to find his footing.

Behind Arthur, Merlin screamed.

Arthur charged in fast, and with a downward thrust cut the man from shoulder to hip. Arthur spun around to Merlin.

Three men now littered the floor but two more had made their way in during the battle. Gwaine was grappling with one. The other stood over Merlin who was writhing in agony on the floor, hands clutched to his chest. A boot to the stomach rocked Merlin onto his back. The man raised his sword, the point directly over Merlin's heart.

Arthur's battle-sharpened mind reacted. He threw his sword with all the strength he had, and the blade found its mark in the man's back. The man went down choking on his blood. Arthur ran to the body, yanked the blade free then plunged it deep into the back of the man hammering at Gwaine. Only when the man was down did Arthur turn all his attention to Merlin. Gwaine didn't need an order to stand guard by the door.

"Merlin!" Arthur called, taking the boy by his shaking shoulder to hold him in place while he looked him over for wounds. The only color to Merlin's face were the bruises and scabs. His features were twisted in pain, making him even more gaunt than he already was, but it was only his hands and wrists he seemed to be protecting. Arthur cursed silently. The bastard who had tried to kill Merlin must have pulled him down by the shackles, reopening the wounds. Blood had soaked through the bandages and was dripping on the floor.

"Arthur?" Gwaine said. Arthur wanted to ignore him and keep his focus on Merlin, but the way the man's voice had cracked wouldn't let him. He turned to Gwaine.

Gwaine was backing up, slowly. "Arthur, we have a problem."

That problem crept up the steps into view. Suddenly, Arthur understood Gwaine's terror, the bone-deep certainty of your doom only steps away from ripping out your throat if you should falter. The creature was huge, hideous, a bulbous lump of exposed muscle as big as the wild boars of the deep woods, a fleshless horned dog right out of tales too dark to ever tell.

It wasn't battle instincts that had Arthur gathering up Merlin and moving back to the ladder along with Gwaine. It was something else, something cold, primal and thoughtless, its existence centered only on the need to get away, to survive, to not let this thing kill him whatever it took.

Arthur clamored backward up the stairs first, shoving the trap door aside with his shoulder. Gwaine followed, and that's when the beast lunged, bellowing.

"Go!" Gwaine screamed. They were up the ladder, through the door. Gwaine kicked it shut and wasted no time tipping a heavy wooden table onto its side and shoving it over the door. Arthur helped, once again using his shoulder, refusing to let Merlin go until the only entrance was blocked. Gwaine added a bookcase to the door, then finally a few chairs.

Either the beast couldn't climb or figured its prey wasn't worth the effort with so much fresh meat already lying dead on the floor. It made no attempt to get in. Arthur and Gwaine looked at each other, Gwaine wide-eyed and as terrified as Arthur had ever seen him. A terrified Gwaine wasn't something you saw everyday. It was something you barely saw at all.

Merlin shivering in Arthur's arms reminded him of other pressing matters. The room was smaller than the study below and round, confirming Arthur's assumption of a tower. He set Merlin on the floor against the wall, as far from the trap door as possible. Besides the furniture piled on the door, there were two windows, another book shelf and rolls of parchment scattered everywhere from Gwaine's hasty barricading.

"Merlin?" Arthur said, gripping Merlin's arm's above the shackles.

"M' all right," Merlin said, sucking a pained breath through his teeth. "Th-the pain's getting better."

Arthur moved the shackles up Merlin's arms as much as he could and grimaced. The edge of the metal must be sharp, the bandages and Merlin's skin a ragged mess of reopened wounds, but at least the bleeding seemed to be slowing. Arthur had to cut the hem of the cloak for more bindings, cursing himself for having tied their packs to the horses. He doubled the bandages, hoping it would offer better protection. Merlin hissed with clenched fists but managed not to pull away.

Arthur called Merlin a coward but they had always been words, never a belief. You couldn't believe someone a coward willing to ride into battle with you, face dragons and hoards of the undead with you, without armor or sword. You couldn't believe someone a coward when they were fighting obvious pain in order to let another do what needed to be done. And bandaging the wounds was causing Merlin great pain. He was shaking harder, moisture making his eyes shine and tension pulling the skin of his face taut. When Arthur finished, Merlin gasped out a choked breath, the next breath a shuddering, ragged inhale. He curled up on the floor, hands clutched tight to his chest.

Arthur rested his hand on the back of Merlin's head, ignoring the oily grime that coated his hair.

"Merlin. The moment we get home, I'm having the servants draw you the best bath you will ever have."

That is, he _mostly_ ignored it.

Merlin lips fought to form a tremulous smile. "I'm h-holding you t-to that. I-I've been wanting to b-be clean for s-s-o long. F-forgot what it's l-like."

Arthur removed his hand to pull the edges of the cloak around Merlin's quaking body. "Rest for now. It's going to be a while before we go anywhere." Merlin did as told and Arthur doubted it was because he'd ordered him. Arthur looked to Gwaine standing by the trap door, watching it like a fox watching the hounds from its hole.

"I now see what there was to be afraid of," Arthur said.

Gwaine gave him a smile that went nowhere near his eyes. "The thing that attacked me was a pup compared to that beast down there." He then dropped to his hands and knees and put his ear to the door. "I don't hear the braggart. Something that big, we should be able to hear it snuffling a mile off."

"You think it's gone?"

"Or it has enough brains in its skull to keep quiet and make us think it went away. You can never say with magical beasts."

"You're that certain it's enchanted," Arthur said with the annoyance normally reserved for Merlin and his weirdness.

Gwaine just smiled at him, and this time some of it did reach his eyes. "You're that certain it's not?"

Gwaine had him there, much to Arthur's further annoyance. Never mind the fact that even Merlin had stated such a beast didn't match the descriptions of anything in the bestiaries, the thing's mere presence _screamed_ of magic.

As Gwaine had said, you knew without a doubt that to be killed by this thing would be worse than death. It was more than the creature's ugly looks that said as much; it was something that could not be explained, only sensed and sensed strongly.

Arthur sighed, scraping a shaking hand down his aching face. "Whatever it's doing, at least we're safe here for the time being."

"Unless more men come and try to break through our barrier."

Arthur glared at him. "That _thing_ would eat them first."

"Not if it's under their command."

"You are bound and determined to see only the negative, aren't you?"

Gwaine sat back on his haunches. "I take offense to that and were we not in such dire straits I'd probably knock you on your arse for it, king or otherwise. Seeing as how we are in dire straits, I'll let it slide, for now."

"I'm ever so grateful for your clemency," Arthur said drier than a fallow field in the dead of summer.

"You should be," Gwaine said cheekily, then quick as a blink sobered. "I'm just trying to be logical about this-"

Arthur barked a laugh. "You, logical? You're about as logical as Merlin."

"Heh, you'd be quite surprised how logical Merlin really is. In fact he'd probably be saying what I'm saying right now if he wasn't being molly-coddled by Morpheus. Our lot in life has been strange the moment we found this castle, to the point that a bunch of demon dogs being controlled by a bunch of sorcerers seems almost sane. Either that or they've all gone so mad it's kill first and ask questions later, never mind the blokes who could probably help these people rid the castle of these beasts. My money's on the former – these things are pets and we're their next meal."

"Either way," Arthur said. "There's nothing we can do about it right now. The men who saw us are all dead, that beast either waiting for us or having wandered off. We need to rest and buy ourselves what time we can until this storm passes."

"If the storm isn't enchanted as well," Gwaine muttered under his breath.

Arthur narrowed his eyes in silent order for Gwaine to shut up. But it was too late, and Arthur now had something else "dire" to consider.

~oOo~

"Oh, you are a glutton for punishment, you," Jimbol laughed. "Or is it some hero complex? You can't help but acting and damn the consequences when it's your kingy in danger?" He clapped his hands together and the action sent bits of rotting flesh flying. When he smiled his wide, sickly smile, it was to show a mouth empty of teeth. "That's it! It's a hero thing, right? You just can't help saving the day."

Merlin wanted to open his mouth, scream spells that would burn Jimbols' body to dust, but his lips seemed fused and his tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth.

Jimbol, still sitting at the table in the dark room, sucked on the end of a bloody rib bone.

"Not much point to it, though. You're not escaping this destiny. You see..." Jimbol leaned forward, waving the rib bone in circles. Merlin realized with a twisting stomach that it was far too big to be from a pig. "Your plight – that of you, your king and your knight – is a plight where words such as futile come in handy, because it's futile, what you're doing. You can't even call it putting off the inevitable." He bit the bone that crunched and snapped.

He said, as though Merlin had argued the matter, "It's really not, I promise. There's been far too long a time, far too long to plan, for you lot to ever find a way out. We need our key and we will bloody well have our key. We're not waiting around this cesspit for another one. Gets too hard to cross back and forth, the longer we wait. So my suggestion would be to sit back, relax and let the inevitable happen."

Jimbol sat back and crunched the bone with relish. "Of course that would be boring, wouldn't it? Hope you still have that hero complex when the time comes, boy." Jimbol smiled, showing bloody, naked gums. "You're going to need it."

~oOo~

Merlin woke with a shudder, a small whimper and his wrists on fire. Lords, how using his magic like that had hurt. It hadn't even been much a spell, just a bit of force to shove that black-cloaked man off his feet, and yet Merlin's wrists felt as though they'd been branded. It was a pain that had radiated through the rest of his body as an ache, adding to the still-throbbing aches already there.

He hurt, not just his ribs and wrists but his shoulders, head, neck, back, all the way down to his feet and it made him long for a brand new body.

The thought of ribs, of rib bones snapping and crunching, made his stomach squirm. To distract himself, Merlin looked around as best he could from the floor.

Arthur was positioned at Merlin's feet, propped against the wall with his head tilted back and his eyes closed. Gwaine was adjacent to him, staring as though hypnotized by the trap door piled with furniture. Other than the colorful stained glass, some shelves and a torch in a sconce, there was little else to see.

There were the parchments, most of them scattered within easy reach. Merlin pulled one to him and unrolled it, a task made annoying by his shaking, weak hands.

"Doing a little light reading, Merlin?" Gwaine said.

Merlin snapped his head around, which with an aching neck and skull was a terrible idea. He had to wait until his vision stopped swimming to answer.

"Just looking. Might as well while we're here." He looked back – slowly – to the parchment. It looked to be architectural drawings, and though Merlin was no architect he still knew the basic outline of a castle when he saw one.

"Gwaine, look at this," he said, his voice subdued by the aches that insisted on lingering.

Gwaine joined him, crouched at his head. Merlin showed him the scroll and Gwaine smiled.

"Well isn't fortune favoring us this hour," he said, putting down that scroll to pick up another.

_It's futile, what you're doing._ Merlin squeezed his eyes shut as though it could block out the words that echoed in his head. When he opened them, it was to Gwaine looking from one scroll to the next with the wide-eyed expression of a boy opening birthday presents.

"We could use these," Gwaine was saying. "We can finally put a path to this blasted maze- hello. What do we have here?" The scroll he opened next was massive, so massive he had to lay it out on the floor and use a few spilled inkwells to hold it down. He stood to survey it at a distance.

"This isn't of the castle," he said, mostly to himself.

Merlin struggled upright as much as his body would let him, which was mostly to his elbows. It didn't show him the entire parchment but it did show him what looked to be a real maze.

"Catacombs," Gwaine said. He chuckled, shaking his head with his hands on his hips. "Forget the bloody armory, we stumbled onto gold. Look here, Merlin." Gwaine crouched and traced out a particular passage marked out in red ink. "I'll bet you two flagons of mead that's a way out. Castle and fortresses always have a back entrance. If we can find this place we'll not only have a way out but plenty to places to hide."

"Unless the people who attacked us are already hiding there," Merlin said.

Gwaine chuffed and muttered something along the lines of "now who's being negative?"

"What?"

Gwaine shook his head. "Nothing. I'll wake her highness."

Arthur wasn't happy about the interruption to his rest, saying it couldn't possibly be is turn for watch, yet. His annoyance was immediately set aside for the maps.

"Gwaine this is brilliant," Arthur said.

"Thank Merlin. He was the one in the mood to read."

And, yet, where there should have been joy over finding such an advantage, what Merlin felt was something niggling in his chest like a worm, a thought he knew was important but that wouldn't surface.

_It's futile, what you're doing_.

"Do either of you find something... odd about this?" he asked.

"That we happened to stumble on their maps?" Gwaine said. He shrugged. "We were bound to stumble on something we actually wouldn't regret."

"No, he's right," Arthur said. He was looking through the scrolls, each one another drawing detailing the various parts of the castle. "You don't keep plans like these in some random room in some random tower where anyone could get to them. These plans show everything – its most strategic points, its most vulnerable sections, its secret passages and hidden entrances. An enemy would sell his soul to get his hands on these. They should be locked up."

Gwaine deflated. "Maybe someone borrowed them and forgot to put them back?" he tried.

Arthur rolled his eyes. "Not unless these people are idiots. Even I can't look at Camelot's designs outside the vault without at least to guards present."

Gwaine tensed. "Do you think these were put here for us to find?"

Arthur's answer was a grim look.

_It's futile, what you're doing_.

"I think he's right," Merlin said, struggling again to sit up. This time Gwaine helped him and he was able to get into a sitting position against the wall. "I think these were meant to be found."

"Why in the world would anyone want their greatest weakness to be found?" Arthur scoffed. "What could anyone hope to accomplish by showing their enemy the way out-" he snapped his jaw shut.

Gwaine said what they were all thinking. "To set a trap."

_It's futile, what you're doing._

"We are being led on," Arthur said. "But why? Those men we fought couldn't have been the only ones here. If they know we're here then why not just come for us? Why these games?"

_Of course that would be boring, wouldn't it?_

Arthur began grabbing scrolls, some he discarded, others he stuffed into his coat.

"Arthur?" Merlin said.

"Trapped or not it's still an advantage. We'll at least know where we're going."

"And where we can go when we have no other choice," Gwaine said, folding instead of rolling the map of the catacombs and handing it off to Arthur.

The gutteral sound of something snarling, something big, froze them all in place. The sound was coming from their right. They turned their heads as one, not wanting to look but having no choice. But all they saw was the window being pelted by a mad flurry of snow.

Until a massive clawed and hairless paw smashed through the window. All three men ducked against the rain of glass, then panic sent them into a frenzy of motion – Merlin trying to scramble to his feet, Gwaine trying to cover him, and Arthur shoving and tossing their barrier aside piece by piece. It took Merlin's terrified brain too long to realize the beast's bulk was making it difficult for the thing to get through. But it sure as hell wasn't going to let a little thing like size stop it. It's upper body was already in, the rest squeezing painfully after with a crunch of manipulated bones.

"Go! Go!" Merlin screamed, terror freeing his body of its pains just enough to let him get back on his feet to help Arthur clear the barrier, Gwaine joining them. But no amount of terror would give him the needed strength, leaving all the work to Arthur and Gwaine.

They cleared the door just as the beast had worked it's way in up to its waist, far narrower than its bulky chest. Arthur swung the door open heedlessly and climbed halfway down.

"The way's clear!" he called. He leaned back as Gwaine helped Merlin halfway down the ladder. He and Arthur then turned as one, closing the trap door as one just as the beast finally cleared the window. The door rattled and creaked dangerously from the creature's furious attacks.

"Let's go," Arthur said fiercely. He led the way, Gwaine supporting Merlin, the fear unable to keep up the supply of adrenaline in his battered body. It did clear his mind, enough to notice not only the lack of dead, but the lack of anything to suggest there had ever even been any dead.

"They're gone, all gone," Merlin said as they hurried down the stairwell.

"Yeah, best not to think about it. There's enough testing the limits of our sanity as is," Gwaine grunted.

They turned into the first hallway they came to, a narrow stretch that hemmed them in with no doors in sight. They did not go far when they heard echoing snarls and the shouts of men heading their way. They ran back to the stairs.

"Damn it, we're not being led, we're being bloody _herded_, Gwaine snarled through a clenched jaw.

The next hall they turned into one flight down was, thankfully, quiet so far. They followed it as far as they dared, seven doors in, to the right down yet another hall, then five doors in before they barged into the nearest room.

It was another bedroom, a mirror image of the last one they had been in, and for a moment Merlin was overcome with the sick thought of them going in circles when he realized this bed still had its blanket. Arthur wasted no time pulling the various drawings from his jacket, and Gwaine wasted no time setting Merlin on a bed he wanted nothing to do with. He was tired, and sore, but it paled to his need to get the hell out of this place.

"What the hell is going on in this place!" Gwaine growled. He took his anger out on the stone wall with the meat of his fist.

"They must want us for something. That has to be the reason why they haven't killed us," Merlin said.

"Or we've been lucky," Arthur said.

"You really think that?" Merlin said. Unfortunately, Arthur was too focused on the parchments to notice Merlin's long-suffering, you-must-be-jesting-with-us glare. Gwaine looked as though he would love nothing more than to agree with Arthur but couldn't quite seem to bring himself to do so.

Then Arthur countered with, "What makes you so sure this... place and these people or these creatures have a purpose for us? Perhaps they're merely, I don't know, trying to scare us off. Maybe we're not being led anywhere, maybe we're being run off, simple as that."

Merlin thought of his dreams, the dreams that made absolutely no bloody sense and yet...

And yet...

_You're not escaping this destiny._

What did that even mean? And how did Merlin even begin to use it as any kind of confirmation that there was more to their being hunted than being chased off the property?

_Oh, well, you see Arthur, as much as I would love to agree with you there're these dreams I keep having where Jimbol's dead body goes on and on about destiny and how we're doomed but he won't tell me why and it's rather hard to listen to him because he's always eating something disgusting and bits of him keep falling..._

Oh, yes, that would go down wonderfully.

But the inability to explain, clearly, why the dream and what it had to say mattered aside, the dream still mattered. Merlin knew, without a doubt, as he knew that being killed by that beasts would be beyond horrible. He knew it was more than a dream because no dream had ever been that vivid, that tangible. He had ifelt/i in that dream – the cold air, the hard, splintered wood of the chair digging into his spine. He had smelled Jimbol's decay and the metallic stench of blood. And when he thought back to it, it was not the fading garbled image of a true dream, it was with the solidarity of a real-life memory.

The only waking vision to ever come close to such realism had been the images in the crystal, images that still haunted his dreams as fresh as now.

So what the dream had to say mattered. And what it had to say was that they were not leaving this castle.

Now how to get that across to Arthur without looking any more like a traumatized lunatic?

"Well, it's been my experience that when someone wants you to leave they either order you out to your face or throw you out by the scruff of your shirt," Merlin said pointedly, and stared just as pointedly at Arthur's back.

Arthur tilted his head back with a sigh. He then whirled around, glaring fire brands at Merlin. "It doesn't matter why we're being chased! We're being chased, that's the facts, making the 'why' completely obsolete unless we don't find a bloody way out of here. So both of you keep your 'whys' to yourself and, please, do me the favor of focusing on 'how' – namely how the hell do we leave this place."

"I say we meet these bastards head on. See just what it is they're making us run to," Gwaine said.

"Give the sorcerers with beasts and greater numbers exactly what they want. Oh, yes, Gwaine, that's absolutely brilliant," Arthur sneered.

"Well it's not as though running about like headless chickens has been doing us any favors."

"It's been keeping us alive!" Arthur wailed like that should have been obvious and Gwain was an idiot not to see it.

Gwaine bristled. "No, it's been putting off the inevitable. This place isn't going to let us leave. You've seen what it has to offer every time we try, that storm included because you _can not_ tell me that there is any way that blizzard is natural."

"You're doing it again," Merlin said above them both, pinching the bridge of his nose.

Both men rounded on him and said as one, "Doing what!"

Merlin flinched back in alarm. "Um... that. Getting, you know, all hot-headed and contradicting and... such." He added a little more bravely. "And it's getting us nowhere."

"Then what do you suggest we do?" Arthur said hotly, or tried to. Instead, the words came out heavy and exhausted, deflated by the growing weight of their situation. It wasn't defeat, more like the precursor to defeat, as rare in Arthur as fear was in Gwaine, and it made Merlin sick inside to see it.

What did they do, when the very place that had trapped them was hell bent on keeping them trapped?

A sudden thought made Merlin perk up, only to immediately sag.

"What?" Arthur pressed, having noticed.

"Well, I was thinking maybe those books Gwaine found might tell us something. But that would mean finding our way to that library."

Arthur looked like he wanted to bash his head against the wall. But he shook it off, straightened his shoulders, grabbed the parchments in one hand and lifted his sword in the other. "You know what? That's as brilliant an idea as we're going to get. Let's go."

TBC...


	6. Chapter 6

Ch. 6

Their path through the castle was mostly uneventful, and that made Merlin nervous. The only opposition met was when Arthur, consulting the various parchments of drawings, had attempted to make for an exit. They had not even been within sight of the door when they were almost spotted by a beast prowling in a stairwell.

That they had yet to be accosted meant that they were going exactly where they were supposed to go. Any help this library could offer would not be help to them. But it was all they had, and Merlin wasn't ready to give up on any options just yet.

But the going was still hard, mostly for Merlin. The cut across his back had reopened, adding to the blood already crusting parts of his shirt, the cuts on his wrists were twice as raw, and together they joined forces to make him burn from his arms to his shoulder-blades. Merlin's feet were also ready to give up the ghost, each step feeling as though another crack was being added to the bones.

Gwaine tried to help, but with the manacles preventing Merlin from draping an arm over Gwaine's shoulder without the chains getting in the way should Gwaine need to fight, and Merlin's ribs making any grip on the rest of his body tricky, by the time they reached the library both Gwaine and Merlin were panting. Gwaine set Merlin gently onto one of the stools in front of the many tables. Merlin, arms resting on the smooth table-top, curled into himself.

It was a short-lived respite when Gwaine thumped a heavy book in front of Merlin. He stabbed his finger at a picture of the worst creature Merlin had ever seen, and he had seen quite a few in his young lifetime.

"That's the bastard I think's behind all this," Gwaine said. "This book was open when I found it and I highly doubt it was a coincidence. But good luck reading the bugger."

Merlin turned the pages with a shaking hand, the drying blood on his wrists tugging at his skin. Gwaine was right; it was a pain to read, steeped in the kind of sickly sweet words even Gwen, who loved poetry, eventually tired of.

Arthur was busy ransacking the rest of the library, picking up one book only to discard it in disgust by tossing it over his shoulder. "Well I doubt these are going to help us. Spell books. Every damn one a spell book."

Merlin focused intently on the tomb in front of him, steering his mind away from the agony of his contained magic.

"The key within," he muttered, a common theme in the book other than this Place with No Name and the benevolent being. There were more pictures of this being, various angles and standing in various states – one picture where it seemed to be moving through a solid wall, one where it was presiding over its followers, one where it was presiding over its followers in agony. Merlin turned back to the picture Gwaine had shown him. There, standing before the beast, was what looked to be the tiny figure of a man, or a picture of a man in a frame. He looked to be asleep while the frame, or whatever it was enclosing him, wept dark droplets.

"Merlin, what do you make of it?" Gwaine said in a breathless hurry as though time were against them.

But Merlin knew with painful certainty that they had all the time in the world. They were supposed to be here, they were supposed to be reading this book. They were supposed to learn something, realize something.

Merlin flipped through the book once more, focusing on the pictures – the beast coming through the wall, the man in the frame, the worshipers in agony but facing away from their deity, facing toward the reader as though begging to be let out. He read the words.

The key within us.

"You've never seen anything like this in any of Gaius' books," Gwaine stated. "Any at all."

"No," Merlin said. "But..." he flipped back to the page with the beast and the framed man. He thought of his dream, of Jimbol at the table dining on blood and bones. Merlin looked at his wrists, the bandages stiff with dried blood.

His tired, pained head slowly, sluggishly, fit the pieces together until they clicked.

Merlin moaned, "Oh, no."

Both Arthur and Gwaine were staring at him.

"What, Merlin? What _oh no_?" Arthur demanded tightly.

"I – I can't be sure. I'm only guessing..."

Arthur moved swiftly to the table. He leaned in on his hands, meeting Merlin's eyes with his own. "Merlin," he said in the calm, even tone when he wanted Merlin's attention, a firm command meant to draw Merlin away from whatever was distracting him.

Merlin swallowed against the tightness of his throat. "I think... someone has to be sacrificed. To this thing."

Color drained from both men's faces.

"For any particular reason or for the fun of it?" Gwaine asked, his voice small.

"Um..." Merlin scanned the other pictures. "Well, it talks of doorways and keys and other places. I could be wrong but I'm thinking they need a blood sacrifice to open a doorway to this nameless place. I – I guess they must be trapped there. Or this creature is trapped there, I don't know. But it makes sense – the key within, doorways, the pictures. Gaius once told me about how there were sects within the old religion that believed taking a life could enhance a magical spell. Most used animals but some believed that taking human life was the ultimate source of magical enhancement."

Arthur slammed his hands on the table and pushed himself roughly away, causing Merlin to jump. "Wonderful! Just what we need, one more reason to hate magic."

Merlin pretended not to hear as he always did, since it was all he could do no matter how it made his heart sink during such declarations. "I'm guessing they need one of us to open this doorway and let this creature out."

Gwaine frowned at this. "Then why not simply take us? Why all this running around, keeping us in?"

"Maybe because it needs to be voluntary?" Merlin said with a shrug, feigning uncertainty. What Gaius hadn't taught him the dragon had. There were levels to magic and power, and that meant levels to the various hidden worlds and the creatures that resided in them. Avalon was the most powerful of these worlds, the creatures able to come and go as they pleased. While other worlds needed the aid of those beyond their realm to open their doors.

But these latter places in need of a key were, for the most part, prisons according to Kilgarrah – prisons created by powerful beings to contain those who had abused the laws of magic, or self-made prisons by those who thought themselves powerful enough to be gods, creating their own worlds and failing, so trapped in their own creations. And such blatant disregard for the power of creation and magic as a whole always had restrictions. One of them being that no will could be forced upon another living creature, no enchantment used to coerce a mortal to sacrifice himself the way the sidhe had enchanted Arthur. There had to be a choice.

Merlin shuddered thinking about it.

And he knew. He knew this was why they had been allowed to the library. He knew this was what they were meant to have found. And he knew, finally, why they were being chased and not merely taken.

There had to be a choice. They had to _want_ to be taken and die.

"Maybe," Merlin said as though someone else were talking for him, because he didn't want to say this, not out loud. "Maybe the magic doesn't work right and they can't take us to be sacrificed unless we let them."

But Arthur shook his head. "Then why are they trying to kill us?"

"Who says they are?" Merlin countered. "We haven't been lucky, Arthur. It's like we've been saying – we've been iled/i."

Gwaine's shoulders sagged. "And we're going to keep being herded until one of us agrees to be this bloody key."

Merlin shrank back, not able to look at either man, feeling as though he had failed them, as though this were all his fault. And wasn't it his fault? Getting captured, them coming to save him. Didn't he bring them to this?

He said, in a small voice, "Maybe."

Arthur shook his head vehemently. "No, I will not accept this. Gwaine, you take that shelf over there. Merlin, keep looking through that book." Arthur went to the shelf he had left off ransacking. "There has to be something. If we keep looking..."

Merlin stared at the book, at the beast standing behind the man on the table. As he stared at it, he gathered his chains tightly into his hands, then into the cloak still wrapped around his shoulders, muffling their sound. If his body would cooperate with him long enough, he could slip away and fix this, keep Arthur's destiny alive, keep Gwaine alive, by giving up his part of it. He could fix this. He _would_ fix this.

Merlin looked up from his book and mentally prepared himself for the pain he would endure when he stood up. It took his aching head a moment to realize that something wasn't right. He looked around.

"Arthur?"

"What?" Arthur snapped, books flying over his shoulder one after the other.

"Where's Gwaine?"

~oOo~

It was a good thing he was going to his doom, or Arthur and Merlin were going to kill him. Gwaine made his way quick as he dared to the kitchen, figuring it a decent enough spot to be surrounded then dragged off for the slaughter. Gwaine didn't consider himself any kind of a damn martyr but he did like to think himself practical, and what practicality told him was that out of the three of them, Camelot could do with one less knight. It couldn't do without its king, the only king that had ever given Gwaine a reason to respect a noble. And it couldn't do without Merlin. That he was a servant be damned. Status had nothing to do with this. Merlin was too kind, too brave and too loyal to be taken from this world. And besides which, what was the point of going to rescue one and protecting the other if they up and died just so some disgusting monster could come back into the world?

It was a logical, practical conclusion. It didn't mean it wasn't scaring the hell out of Gwaine. What if the thing decided to ieat/i him? Now that's a fine way to go – as the key to some hell dimension and a snack for its denizen. And he was heading to the kitchen, how convenient for the denizen.

Gwaine forced his legs to carry him onward, anyway. He reached the kitchen and cocked an eyebrow. The heavy doors had been ripped to splinters. Second thoughts tugged at him mercilessly. He ignored them and stepped over the wreckage.

Positioned in the center of the room where the table had been, Gwaine sheathed his sword and lifted his arms to embrace his fate.

"Well. Here I am. Ready and willing to be sacrificed and all that. Well, I may have to argue the willing part where the fate of my friends are concerned. So how about a deal? You let them leave this place without bother, I come along and bleed all over you sacrificial table without a fuss. How about that? Sound like a fair bargain?"

He blinked, he could have sworn he had only blinked, and suddenly he was surrounded – men in cloaks and beasts between them, oozing whatever it was that filled Gwaine with dread, that made a part of him beg not to go through with this.

It would be worse than death, and he knew it.

_No more worse than watching it happen to Merlin or Arthur._

"Do we have a bargain?" Gwaine stressed, his hand drifting to his sword.

The cloaked men bowed their heads as one in agreement.

"Oh," Gwaine said, surprised. He hadn't expected it to be that easy. Actually, he'd been rather hoping for a fight. It didn't seem right not to go down fighting, but where his friends were concerned, well... it was an exception without question.

Gwaine dropped his arms and smiled tightly. "Shall we be off, then?"

~oOo~

"When I find him I'm going to kill him!" Arthur snarled for the second time when he took a wrong turn. The hall they wanted didn't dead end, which meant they now had to backtrack. Merlin – stick figure that he was – was getting heavy in his arm.

Merlin said nothing, either knowing better to or too focused on not stumbling. His face was mostly expressionless except for the tautness of pain and something Arthur might have thought was sadness. Which was all wrong. They weren't supposed to be sad, they were supposed to be angry, because Gwaine was a stupid, self-sacrificing bastard.

Which was hypocritical, Arthur knew. They had all been thinking it, even Arthur as much as he had tried to keep his thoughts focused on finding a way out. And Merlin – well, he was Merlin, and might have been the first out the door had he not been injured.

They were all a bunch of self-sacrificing bastards, really, but Gwaine more the bastard because... because Arthur was king, damn it. It was his _right_ (since he didn't want to call it a privilege) to chose himself as a sacrifice.

_And that's exactly why he went. Because you're king, Merlin is his friend, and the man doesn't think his life is worth anything_.

Lords, Arthur really was going to kill him as soon as he saved him.

But first he had to find him.

Arthur already knew where to look. He checked the pages of drawings one-handed, trusting to Merlin's theory that the people of this place had only wanted a sacrifice, and now that they had one would leave them alone. Arthur would never admit it, but Merlin often made sound theories.

He found the hall they were supposed to take, followed it all the way to the end and another stairwell. He took the steps to the very bottom, deep below the castle to a chamber of doors. Second door on the right opened to another set of stairs, leading them into a wine cellar filled with fat barrels, taller than Arthur and three times as wide. There were no other doorways. Arthur checked the notes and scowled.

"These are useless!" he snapped.

"It's... a secret catacomb," Merlin panted, his pinched face shining with sweat.

"Right. Right!" Arthur said. He rechecked the parchments. "Right. Okay. It's a bit faded but this section looks to be marked in red." Arthur dragged Merlin over to one of the barrels. He leaned Merlin against it as he searched the thing, and the moment Merlin's weight was pressed against its side, something clicked and the front of the barrel swung open. Musty, humid air gushed out across Arthur's face.

Merlin smiled wearily. Arthur traded the mess of parchments for the map of the catacombs Gwaine had handed him. He leaned Merlin back against him, and together they stepped through the barrel into the catacombs.

Like most catacombs, the tunnels were caves mostly carved by human hands than by nature. The tunnels were wide, the walls almost smooth and the entries into the next branch of tunnels ornately etched. Torches were already lit, lighting their way. Where once this had unnerved Arthur, it now angered him. Everything about this place made him want to rip it apart and bury it for all time. It was an abomination, a curse, a devil's pit and when they left this place – and they would leave it – he would find a way to raze it to the ground. Then burn it with its own torches.

They followed the winding tunnels through chambers that seemed to serve no purpose, doors open to empty rooms - no tombs, no niches with bones, no boxes of gold or jewels. Nothing.

Until they reached the dead-center of the catacombs and a massive chamber twenty times larger than the cathedral they had found on first entering the castle. It was a natural cave, a forest of stalagmites hanging high above them, and the only thing touched by man – if it had even been made by mortal hands – the bloodstained stone table in the center of the room. Lying like a body waiting for the tomb, hands folded over his sword resting on his chest...

"Gwaine!" Merlin shouted.

Arthur and Merlin made straight for their wayward and stupidly self-sacrificing knight. Not three steps into the chamber and they were surrounded by the men in cloaks and snarling beasts, too many to count but still not enough to even begin to fill the chamber.

"What have you done to him, you bastards!" Arthur shouted.

"A kindness."

Arthur felt Merlin stiffen against him. The men and beasts parted, leaving a clear path toward Gwaine. A man stepped around the table, a familiar man, an impossible man in the midst of decay and yet still upright and talking.

"No," Merlin whimpered, shrinking back and shaking. "No. You were a dream. Just a dream."

"Really, Merlin?" the man said with a look of mocking reprimand. "Really? Goodness, boy, I thought you were smarter than that. 'Course I suppose I can't really blame you. Not the best form to inspire any trust in reality but, oh, it was so delicious the way it made your heart flutter like a scared little bird. And I've been so disgustingly bored."

"Who are you!" Arthur demanded.

The man gave him a puzzled look. "Now, now, kingy. I would think you the type to remember those you run through. But Merlin knows me, don't you Merlin?"

Merlin didn't say anything, but his shaking was answer enough. Arthur tightened his arm around Merlin, felt the boy's heart racing in his thin chest.

"You're the man who took him. Who tortured him!"

The man – Jimbol, Arthur recalled – clapped his hands sending bits of skin flying. "Well done your lordship! Although, technically I'm not him. This is merely a form, a representation, a means for communication. I've been using it to visit Merlin in his dreams, give him a bit of a heads up to the situation."

Arthur shot Merlin a look, part alarm, part growing anger. Merlin looked frantically from Jimbol to Arthur.

"I – I didn't... I didn't understand them, I didn't know..."

"Of course you didn't Merlin," Jimbol simpered. "More fun that way. Poor boy, he thought he was going mad. But it no longer matters. You're here, now. The past is the past and we need to get on with things. The door has gone too long without a sacrifice. Any longer and it will be closed for good, and you can't possibly imagine how difficult it is trying to get anything through a door that wants to suck you right back in. My poor children." He looked to his men and beasts with mock pity. "Can you not see them straining, fighting the pull of the door? The realm does not like us to stay gone for long. It is a lonely realm, but so _utterly_ dull."

Jimbol waved to his men and one broke away from the group, moving toward Gwaine with a curved dagger in hand.

"No, you can't!" Arthur bellowed, surging forward and dragging Merlin with him. "You can't! I chose myself, do you here? Myself!"

Jimbol threw his head back and barked a laugh. "Oh, you are priceless, your lordship! Priceless. I can see why you're so fond of protecting him, Merlin, this king is definitely a keeper. But," he clucked his tongue. "What's done is done. First come and first serve and all that. But we will be needing another sacrifice in thirty year's time if you'd like to volunteer then. We'd be happy to have you."

With a sneer, Arthur lowered Merlin to the floor. "You'll not have anyone ever again. As king I will make sure of it, starting now!" He raised his sword and surged forward, his only intent to run the bastard with the knife through. He managed five steps when pain exploded in his skull and the world went black.

~oOo~

"Arthur!" Merlin screamed, lunging to his feet. He was up, but then lurched forward and fell to his knees when pain slammed through him. So he crawled to Arthur's prone form instead.

Jimbol laughed. Then sneered. "What a blockhead. I admire his courage, I really do, but did he really think he could just charge like that and expect nothing of it? I would have killed him on principal but your overly noble friend, Gwaine, had struck a bargain, and I am a being of my word, I'm afraid. Now, enough interruptions. Let's get this done."

The man with the knife positioned himself next to Gwaine. He lifted Gwaine's wrist, pulled back the sleeve and with agonizing slowness slide the knife across his skin.

Horror clenched Merlin's chest like a vice. Again he tried to move forward, to help, to do something but pain and weakness drove him back to his knees. He knelt there, trembling, as Gwaine's blood dripped to the floor.

The cavern rumbled, sending rocks and dust scattering and clattering to the floor.

"Oh, good, it begins," Jimbol said chipperly. He turned. The very air began to shimmer in front of him like water. It warped, rippled then swirled together before expanding into a whirlpool of black and red. The hole in the world widened, oozing black, and Merlin thought he saw something glowing on the other side – two dots like yellow eyes.

"Watch this, Merlin, you will love it!" Jimbol laughed above the rumbling. "You think this form a thing of nightmares? It is nothing compared to what I am. I am the master of dreams, Merlin! King of nightmares, and I will feed on your terror and the terror of your kingdom until you beg me to sacrifice you to my world!"

A head emerged like that of its picture – a ram's skull, but spiked, black, dripping gore and bits of flesh like oil. Its stench was that of blood and decay, choking the breath in Merlin's already sick lungs. Forcing harsh coughs from his abused chest.

The man went around the table and slit Gwaine's other wrist. His blood dripped to the floor, taking his life with it.

Merlins' heart hammered so hard he thought it was going to burst. He watched as the blood pooled on the floor, as color drained from Gwaine's face, and the door widened on the other side of the table. The great head dripping and oozing eased itself through over Gwaine's body, studying it like a man would a leg of lamb it was anxious to eat.

It was not enough that Gwaine had to bleed. This thing was going to devour him, leave nothing to bury, only a memory. Just like Lancelot. Just like Freya, and his father, and so many others taken from Merlin.

Merlin felt his magic boil and surge. He had to do something, anything. He couldn't let this happen, not again, not to Gwaine, not to anyone. He could do something and he would and damn the consequences. He was not helpless. He was not a fragile, cowering child to be tormented and driven by fear. He was a warlock, and he would fight. No matter what it took.

The great head lowered toward Gwaine and the great mouth opened baring serrated teeth. A warty tongue slide from its mouth and under Gwaine's back.

And Merlin screamed.

His magic ripped from him like a hand punching through his chest and ripping out his soul. Fire burned up his arms and through his body. He felt as though his bones were shattering, his blood were boiling, his nerves were melting. It was an agony that surpassed all words, pushing blood from his nose, his eyes and out of the corners of his mouth.

But within the pain - ecstasy; his magic free and rolling like a great wave of iridescent white through the chamber. Jimbol and the beast looked over at Merlin as one, and there was only enough time for Jimbol to widen his eyes when the wave hit them. Jimbol vanished in an explosion of dissolving flesh. The beast was shoved back into its doorway but fought to get out. The men and beasts around Merlin ran to and fro flickering in and out of existence. The cavern rumbled like thunder, shook like an earthquake dislodging larger stones that smashed into those who did not flicker entirely away. The great beast shrieked and lashed as it was pulled deeper into the door, and Merlin kept screaming.

The people and beasts vanished, and the door swirled shut. The spot of air where it had appeared imploded and the shock wave ripped through the cavern and beyond. The rumbling increased, as did the falling debris.

Magic continued to pulse through Merlin, horrible and wonderful. It fed strength to his body even as it seemed to rip him to shreds. He stumbled upright then forward to the table. He pulled Gwaine off unable to be gentle about it and dragged him to Arthur. Taking Gwaine's wrists in his hands, he poured magic into the wounds, sealing them though it was agony to do so. He then placed one hand on Arthur, the other on Gwaine, and screamed into the air.

"_Wake_!"

Both men startled awake with a gasp. At exactly the same time, Merlin's body could take no more, and so took him under.

~oOo~

"What the hell!" Gwaine gasped glancing wildly around, wondering if this was that fate worse than death because it certainly looked it. Rocks were tumbling around them, Arthur was sitting groggily beside him, and Merlin was sprawled on the floor, blood staining his face and soaked all the way through the bandages on his wrists.

But never let it be said of Gwaine that he was a man slow to come to his senses, even when drunk... or whatever he currently was. He was alive, that's what he was; his heart was still beating, his lungs still taking in air, his friends were beside him about to be smashed, and now was not the time to waste the good fortune of him being in a position to do something about it.

"We have to go!" Gwaine shouted above the rumbling. He grabbed Arthur by the arm and pulled them both to their feet, then scooped Merlin into his arms. Arthur, more clearheaded, took the lead.

"I hope you know where you're going!" Gwaine shouted.

Arthur answered by leading them around the table where Gwaine could have sworn he'd been lying not moments ago. On the other side was a small doorway, easy to miss in a place this large. They dodged debris that barely missed them, following tunnels to more quaking chambers and more collapsing hallways until, finally, they came to a set of stairs leading straight up.

They leaped through the entry at the top of the stairs, into a cave, just as the passage behind them buried itself.

Both men crouched among the boulders, coughing and waving away the dust. Gwaine looked up through the inky blackness and saw what appeared to be a sliver of dark blue. He nudged Arthur in the ribs with his elbow then pointed the way with his chin.

They followed the light, which meant having to pick their way through boulders and rocks without falling, the very last thing Gwaine wanted to do with an unconscious Merlin in his arms. Definitely unconscious. Had to be unconscious.

_Please, please let him be only unconscious_.

The sliver grew into a cave entrance they had to duck to get through. They stepped into snow and clear air, not a single snowflake in sight and the land glittering under the moonlight. But the rumbling continued. They followed it around the hill where the cave was located, hidden by a pile of boulders and rocks. They came out to see what must have been the back of the castle just as it fell in on itself raising a great heaping cloud of dust and debris.

Arthur laughed.

"What?" Gwaine snapped.

Arthur shook his head. "Nothing. Nothing at all." Then he looked at Merlin and all humor vanished. He moved to Merlin, pressed his fingers to his neck, and heaved a breath of heartfelt relief. "He's alive."

Gwaine tilted his head back and breathed a very much similar breath. "Oh, thank the gods."

"Do you know what happened in there?" Arthur asked.

Gwaine shook his head. "Not a clue."

"We'll have to ask Merlin when he wakes, and he will wake," he said to Merlin like an order.

"Then let's make sure he does," Gwaine said, and led the way back to the cave.

TBC...

A/N: You guys are making me all kinds of happy with your reviews :D I know you have many questions. Soon will come many answers.


	7. Chapter 7

Ch. 7

Merlin was quite sure he should have woken up dead today. When he did wake up, he certainly felt as though he had died. Died, been trampled and tossed into a pyre for good measure. And yet he could feel his heart beating, feel cold air flow to and from his lungs, and he was shivering - shivering because he was cold.

"Gwaine, have you brought more wood, he's freezing!" Merlin heard Arthur shout. He cracked an eye open and even that hurt, as though his eyelids had been pasted shut. He saw Arthur's blurry form next to a blurry fire in need of more kindling.

"I found something even better!" Gwaine called excitedly. The place, where ever they were, echoed sharply with the clop of horse hooves, then Arthur's high-pitched laugh of joy.

"Smart lads. They were standing just outside the ruins. I saw them when I was digging for more wood. Here." Splinters of wood clattered to the ground. Arthur quickly added them to the pile.

"That's all there is, I'm afraid," Gwaine went on. "That place buried itself good."

"No matter. We're leaving this place. The bleeding has stopped and if we use any more of that cloak to bandage him we'll have nothing to keep him warm. Get him ready."

Merlin watched through his one slitted eye as Gwaine moved toward then behind him. He felt the knight's hands slide under his body and lift. Pain ripped through Merlin like a wave, and blackness took him once again.

When Merlin next woke, it was to aches rather than pain and the ability to open both eyes. The first thing to register other than his body's more mild complaints was the softness beneath him and warmth all around him. He blinked up at a familiar ceiling, then turned his head taking in a very familiar room.

His room, to be precise, with his things, scant as they were. He was in his bed, with his blanket.

And that meant they were home.

Merlin's next breath shuddered from his lungs, followed by the next after that. He felt as though his chest were filling up - relief, joy, more relief – and that soon it would burst. His vision blurred until moisture slid down his face. He lifted a hand to wipe it away, only to be distracted by the clean white bandages wrapped around his arm. Looking to the other limb he saw the same. Looking down, he saw more white peeking through the collar of his nightshirt – his warm, wonderful nightshirt.

The moisture pooled and fell more rapidly. He was home, free, safe. No more beatings, no more cold, no more hunger, no more Jimbol and beasts and monsters coming from portals. He, Arthur, Gwaine...

Arthur and Gwaine.

Merlin snapped upright then dropped back when his ribs twanged in complaint. He hit the pillow with a grunt and lay there, breathing through the pain.

"Gaius," Merlin called, though it came out as more of a squeak. Merlin cleared his throat. "Gaius?" Hoarse, but better.

The old physician hurried through the door. On seeing Merlin with his eyes open his body seemed to deflate as though finally releasing the breath he'd been holding forever.

"Oh, thank goodness. I knew you would wake soon but you still had me worried. How are you feeling, Merlin?" Gaius asked. He didn't wait for an answer but launched into his usual fussing of feeling Merlin's forehead then checking the bandages on his wrist.

"Less dead," Merlin croaked. "Gaius... Arthur, Gwaine, are they...?"

"They're fine, Merlin. I dare say a lot better off than you. Arthur had a bit of a bump on his head and Gwaine cuts on his wrists but nothing serious."

Now it was Merlin's body's turn to deflate, every muscle easing out of its bow-string tension.

"And from what they told us you've had quite the adventure," Gaius said with a pointed look. Then he smiled. "But one you can tell when you are up to it. You're going to be feeling quite weak for some time. I do not know what you were forced to do but it left you in a terrible mess. Arthur and Gwaine weren't sure if you were going to make it." He filled a cup with water and held it while Merlin drank as much as he could. Knowing Gaius, it was to be easy on everything from food to water until he was better.

Merlin then suffered through having his shirt lifted and his ribs prodded, and still being more than tender his body was not happy about it.

But when Gaius was done, he adjust Merlin's shirt carefully, followed by the blankets, fiddling with them as if intent on their perfection. When he was finally satisfied, he placed his hand on Merlin's head and looked at him, long and lingering the way people will when committing every detail of what they were seeing to memory. Even groggy as Merlin was, he didn't miss the wet shimmer in Gaius' eyes.

"I'm so glad they found you," Gaius said. His voice cracked, there, at the end.

Merlin reached up with a shaking hand and gripped the solid wrist.

A soft knock at the door ended the moment. Quickly wiping his eyes with his sleeve, Gaius rose, composed himself and answered.

Arthur and Gwaine stood on the other side, looking for all the world like two little boys wanting to ask if their friend could come out and play.

"We, uh... came to... you know," Gwaine stammered. "And you weren't in your chambers and we heard voices and thought that maybe..."

Gaius smiled with a small chuckle. "Yes, Gwaine, he is awake. And, yes, you can both see him. But not for long, he's still very weak." He then shuffled aside, making way for the two men to enter the small room, Gwaine wearing his biggest smile and even Arthur looking pleased.

"About time," Arthur said. "I told Gaius you were most likely pretending so you could go on lazing about."

"Yes. That's it exactly. Nothing at all to do with being too weak to pour my own cup of water," Merlin said dryly but with good humor. Not enough good humor when Arthur's smile faltered a little.

Only to reform itself into something softer, more fond. "It's good to see you awake, Merlin." Then fond became a smirk. "Because now you can tell us what happened."

"Yes, please. It's been driving us both mad," Gwaine said. "How the hell did we get out of that place alive?"

"Oh," Merlin said, thinking fast. "Um, well. This... door, I guess you could call it, began to open. Everyone was distracted by it and I used that moment to push Gwaine off the table. I guess it caused the spell to backfire or something when the whole place collapsed. I don't remember anything after that. Sorry."

Merlin winced internally as he often did when having to lie. He hated having to do it, always had and always would until the time he could finally tell Arthur – or Arthur found out. But not now, not after what they had been through, after nearly losing Gwaine to magic.

And that was always the problem, wasn't it? Just when Merlin thought Arthur might come around to accept magic as something that could be used for good, some enchantment or sorcerer came along to put him right back in the mindset of his father and magic being evil.

But someday, Merlin would tell him the truth.

"That must have been some backlash. It certainly did a number on you," Gwaine said, grabbing Merlin's foot under the blanket and giving it a gentle squeeze.

"But not us," Arthur said thoughtfully.

Merlin replied easily and with a shrug, "You both were on the floor. I was upright." Which was true, kind of.

"Could explain why the manacles were so easy to get off when they were such a pain before," Gwaine said. "They must have been knocked loose."

Merlin could only offer up another shrug. The manacles he couldn't explain. How his magic had broken through them he definitely couldn't, and he made a mental note to ask Kilgarrah about it when he was able.

"Still rather uneventful, though," Gwaine said, scratching behind his ear. "Not the whole caving in part or the magical explosion part. The part where you pushed me off the table and, poof, evil destroyed. Not exactly one for the legends, is it?"

Arthur whacked him hard on the shoulder. Gwaine rubbed his shoulder, affronted. Arthur then grabbed Gwaine by the back of the shirt and shoved him out the door.

"Come on, Merlin needs his rest. The sooner he's better the sooner my armor gets polished and the stables mucked.

Merlin gripped his chest, fighting a laugh that he would only regret. Then the door shut, leaving him alone with his thoughts, and his bandaged wrists lying there for him to see.

Somewhere in the deep recesses of his mind, an echo of unimaginable pain whispered to him.

_Was it worth it, Merlin? Was it worth nearly dying? Was it worth so much pain?_

Merlin curled his fingers into a fist, feeling the pull of cuts and damaged flesh.

_Would you do it again?_

Merlin shivered, swallowing against a tight throat. Because even remembering that echo of pain, the answer was yes. It would always be yes.

~oOo~

"Your ventures have not been kind to you, young warlock," Kilgarrah said.

"Believe me," Merlin said, sliding from the saddle of the horse. "This is an improvement." He'd enchanted the horse before arriving, and it stood calmly, not seeing a great dragon but a cow grazing in the clearing.

Merlin leaned heavily against the horse, the ride having taken more out of him than he thought it would. Gaius had warned him that only a week of bed rest wasn't time enough for him to get his strength back. He needed more time, but Merlin had too many questions, questions that had been keeping him up at night.

"If I had known of your fate, I would have come to you," Kilgarrah said.

Merlin smiled up at him. "And I would have called, but I couldn't." He then told Kilgarrah everything, of his capture by slavers, of the manacles, the rescue, the castle, the doorway and his magic reacting.

Kilgarrah's reaction was to chuckle. "Ah, and this merely proves what I have been telling you for so many years. You are powerful, Merlin. Your captors might as well have tied you up with string for all the good those manacles would have done."

Merlin narrowed his eyes in annoyance. "Those _manacles_ nearly killed me when I released my magic."

"But they did not. Your magic made sure of that. Even string can be painful if wound tightly enough."

Merlin shuddered when the whisper of remembered pain rose to the surface. "Not like this. This was..."

Kilgarrah looked down on him kindly. "I did not say it was easy. But you and your magic will be stronger for it. That is both the price and the reward of doing what must be done."

Merlin nodded, finding comfort in the dragon's words. "What was that creature? And how was I able to drive it back?"

The dragon thought for a moment, then, "I can not say."

Which had Merlin's eyes nearly popping out of his head. "You can't... but I thought you knew everything!"

"As much as I would enjoy boasting of such a feat, I am not a god. My knowledge is limited to what must be known, and there are things in this world where knowledge of their existence can be dangerous. But there are tales from times before even my existence, of creatures meant to be forgotten, and creatures who were never worth remembering. For a creature such as the one who you described to rely so heavily on outside powers to bring it into this world, it could not have been very powerful to begin with. Sometimes the illusion of power is all a being has to maintain its existence. When that illusion is broken, then that being is nothing."

Merlin frowned. "So... I didn't destroy a god-like creature?"

Kilgarrah laughed. "I am afraid not, young warlock. But do not think that made it no less formidable. Whatever this being, it was good that you sent it away, never to return. It may not have been strong, but that does not mean it could not have grown in power."

A little well of pride swelled in Merlin's chest.

~oOo~

"Gwaine, we really shouldn't..."

"Yes, we should, Merlin. It's not like we're going on patrol, just to the other side of the castle."

But even the other side of the castle was enough to wind Merlin, causing him to stumble. Getting his strength back was as much of a pain as having injuries. Just when he thought he could handle anything simply because he managed a few steps without getting exhausted, he found out the hard way that his body still had miles to go.

"Not much further, Merlin, promise," Gwaine said. "Besides, it'll be worth it, especially after being cooped up in that tiny room of yours for so long."

When they reached their destination, Merlin immediately recognized it and with quite a bit of trepidation.

"Oh, no, Arthur doesn't want me to help him train, does he?"

Gwaine gave him an odd look. "No. Of course not. Here, put this on." He handed Merlin a heavy cloak trimmed in fur, then a pair of thick gloves. Only when Merlin was bundled up to Gwaine's satisfaction did they go outside.

The weather had been kind the past few days, the snow having melted and the air not as frigid but still liable to chill Merlin's healing body had he not been dressed so warmly. They went out to the training ground where a chair was waiting, and Gwaine had him sit.

Not minutes later, Arthur and the knights arrived for training. Gwaine took that moment to vanish.

Merlin's heart sank as he tried to fathom what Arthur was up to.

"Comfortable?" Arthur asked, unsheathing his sword and giving it a few deft twirls.

"Um... yes?"

"Good. And no falling asleep because I want you to pay close attention."

"Okay. To what?"

Arthur held up the sword. "To this. Since I can't start teaching you proper use of the sword until you're completely healed I want you to observe."

Merlin blinked, then relaxed. "Oh." Then perked up. "Oh!"

Arthur smiled. "Yes, oh. Now where the hell is... oh, here he comes."

Gwaine trotted back onto the field, dressed in chain mail and ready for a day of training. While the rest of the knights spread out staking their own spots for practice, Gwaine and Arthur stayed in front of Merlin.

"Watch closely, Merlin. First we'll run through a few defensive moves in which to disarm your opponent without needing to exert too much strength. Now..."

Merlin watched with rapt attention as Arthur and Gwaine disarmed each other with an ease that made it seem so possible, even for Merlin.

Merlin didn't need to know how to fight with a sword, not any more now that he knew what he could do, bound in enchanted chains or not. But he didn't care. He wanted to know, anyway, and Gwaine and Arthur wanted to show him.

It was the kind of things they were willing for each other, after all.

The End

A/N: Hope you all enjoyed my first multi-chapter foray into Merlin. I know some of you are probably disappointed that I didn't provide a more detailed explanation on the creature, but A: I really loved the idea of even Kilgarrah not knowing everything and B: I also loved the idea of things being out there that are so evil they are never spoken of or so forgotten even the most ancient of beings barely remember them. Even though I am a sucker for explanations I'm also a sucker for the incredibly mysterious.

Thank you all for you wonderful feed back. It always does my writerly heart good to know something I wrote is being enjoyed. I do have other works in the making, most of them for other fic-a-thons and Big Bangs and the like, so there will be more multi-chapter fic in the future for anyone interested. Again, thank you for your comments. So glad you enjoyed :D


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